An Extreme Seventh Year Marauder Style
by lollipopprongs
Summary: Lily's back for her final year at Hogwarts and is finally realizing, and getting, what she wants:James Potter.But what will she lose while getting the raven haired boy?How much drama could persue these teenagers in a year?A whole lot, that's for sure
1. Sirius Conbustion

**Disclaimer (for the entire story)****: I do own Harry Potter. That's all there is to it. **

**Drum roll please! Here the story I promised! For those of you who didn't read An Extreme Summer Marauder Style, you can still read this one. It would make more sense to read the other first, but you can read this one separately, they don't depend on each other.**

**Oh, Merry (late) Christmas to all of you, Happy (also late) New Year, Happy (is everything late?) Birthday to me, and if any of you have had a birthday in the Christmas season, MERRY NEW BIRTHDAY TO YOU!**

**Okay, I'm done now.**

**WAIT! (I know, I need to shut up) Thank you Lara, for helping me come up with the most random stuff imaginable! Okay, now that is all.**

**Seriously. **

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**Chapter 1: Sirius Combustion**

We are late. We are headed to the train station about a half an hour late! Whose fault is this, you may be wondering. Sirius Black and his stupid hair!

Yes, we are having all this trouble because his hair wouldn't stay the way he wanted it to! But did he just use magic? No, he "didn't think of it". Instead he kept us waiting for _forever_ and then realizes that he, in fact, can use magic. Arrogant, mental, pratty boys!

When we finally arrived at Kings Cross Station, and we just crossed over to the platform the clock rang eleven o'clock. When people tell you 'Don't be late!' listen, and don't be late! The train was rolling before our eyes. Leaving us. Leaving the head boy and girl, and all of their friends behind. Leaving us there without a second thought.

"Come on!" James called over his shoulder as he ran to jump onto the train, which was now gaining speed.

We all ran, seeing as we didn't have much choice if we wanted to get to school. One problem occurred through this plan. We can't carry our bags while running. So now we are standing, panting, in a moving train, the doors still wide open, without our bags!

"My bag!" Shay cried.

"Don't worry, I have a plan," Sirius said as he raised his wand before us. Before we knew what he was going to do, and before we could stop him, he raised the wand and said, "Accio bags!"

Now, this sounds like a good idea. The only problem was that the bags didn't know, and had no way of finding out where the door was, and moving at top speed, they all smashed into the side of the train, only one, mine, coming into the compartment, crashing, sending all of us to the floor in an injured heap. I felt clothes, shoes, and all of my other possessions being thrown into the compartment, some landing to the floor with a _thump_, others, the clothes, landed softly.

We felt the train jerk to a halt. I could smell smoke, which must have come from the train.

I opened my eyes cautiously, unsure whether I wanted to see the result of my bag's explosion in the compartment. I was devastated. All of my stuff, underwear and all were thrown around the compartment. I noticed one pair of my underwear sitting on Peter's head, my bra lying in James' lap. I wanted to close my eyes, fall asleep, and start this day over again.

"Lily, I found your favorite underwear!" Yvonne said, holding up a pair of blue and white striped underwear that, were indeed, my favorite. I felt my face turn scarlet, and I attempted to hide in one of my sweaters.

Before I got my head into the sweater, I heard a loud voice, "Sirius Black, get to the front of the train immediately!" they were definitely mad. "Everyone else please exit the train onto the platform."

We all got out onto the platform. I stood there, staring at the train, which Sirius must have been the first person to make explode. Yes, Sirius made the train explode. The train was now a heap of parts and people attempting to fix it. The air was still thick with smoke, and more smoke was steadily pouring from the train.

As people started averting their eyes from the wreck, I noticed they were looking astonished at something else. Someone else. Me. What did I do? Why was everyone staring at me?

Peter still had my underwear on his head when a girl from our year came to talk to me.This was even stranger because I didn't talk to her, ever. She was too ditzy to talk to.

"Something about you has changed, Lily," she said, staring at me for a solid minute before exclaiming, "You cut your hair!"

I was amazed at how stupid this girl could be, and decided to be nasty, "No shit Sherlock!" I said in my best imitating of a preppy person. My friends were laughing, as I turned away from the girl and started closer to them.

"Who's Sherlock?" I heard her call after me. Remus and Yvonne were the only to understand my muggle phrase, being raised in half muggle families, and they were laughing at the girl's expression, as was I.

About ten minutes later, Sirius came back with a pouty face. "They gave me detention!" he complained.

"What did they give you detention for?" Peter asked, very, very stupidly. Does he get smart over the summer and then lose it when school starts?

"Oh, I don't know Peter," I said sarcastically, "Maybe blowing up the god damn train!" I roared, cause many people to stare at me as if I were crazy.

"Really? You blew up the train? When?" Peter asked.

We all stared at him blankly, not comprehending how one person could be so stupid. Finally, James said, "While you were sleeping, Peter."

"You came here last night?" He asked, amazed. He must be way out of it today.

"Yeah, Pete, I sleepwalked." Sirius said sarcastically.

"And they still gave you detention?" Peter asked.

Sirius sighed, "Just take Lily-flowers underwear off of your head!" he said exasperated. That was when I heard a loud chorus of laughter, and realized just how loud Sirius had said his last line.

A group of Slytherin boys, including Sev, were standing there laughing at Peter, and me.

"You have a wild night with Pettigrew, Evans?" one boy asked from afar. I went a deep crimson, and suddenly wished I had worn that sweater, or at least stayed in the exploding train.

I turned as to not look at them, this made them laugh harder. I didn't notice until the laughter stopped that anyone had left. I was so preoccupied with fighting back tears of humiliation that I didn't notice anything else around me. I felt a small hand on my shoulder, and looked to see Sonya standing next to me.

I now realized that James, Sirius, Remus, Shay, and Yvonne were all over there, ready for a fight. Sonya stayed back to be with me, and Peter was still confused about what he didn't seem to remember from the night before. Gosh he's dumb today! He could go out with the ditzy woman and they'd be a perfect match. Maybe they could understand each other!

"Lily, they're just stupid boys. Don't pay attention to them," Sonya said as she hugged me. Sonya was the perfect person to comfort you. I only flinched slightly at her touch, I noticed. I was getting better around people everyday. I smiled at the thought.

"I know, it's just…" But that was just it, what was it?

"I know. They're just stupid and we need to ignore them," she told me, and I nodded my head.

"Everyone! Please return to your compartments, we are officially leaving now!" Someone bellowed among the crowd. That was when we noticed that the train seemed to be fixed, and looked just as it had before it was rolling away from us.

"Come on," Sonya pulled me to our compartment, and we walked in. But it wasn't filled with all of my stuff. In fact, only my truck remained. I opened it, and everything was in it neatly. Just like I always had it.

"Who-." I started.

"Nope, get to your meeting! We don't want miss head girl to be late. Got your badge?" Shay said, walking in smiling.

"Yup," I said, pulling out my new badge with a large letter 'HG' on it.

"Well, put it on!" Shay demanded.

"You already saw it, I have to go," I told my friend. Then I turned and headed down the train. It was rolling along again, I noticed.

When I go to the compartment and opened the door, I was slightly embarrassed that all of the prefects and James were there already. I headed over to where James stood, and looked at the sitting prefects.

"Well Ms. Evans, the party has been waiting on you," James scolded playfully.

"Oh, how sorry I am at this moment," I said sarcastically.

"Well, I think you need to plead forgiveness," James was still playing around.

"In your dreams," I said smirking.

"Will you two stop flirting so we can get this meeting over with?" A fifth year boy from the back asked. I flushed a light pink, and James laughed.

"What's the hurry, Reg? Got a girlfriend waiting for you?" James asked the boy.

The boy's pale face flushed a light pink and he glared at James as he said, "No."

James laughed again, turning to me. "Sirius' younger brother," he explained to me.

"Oh, they look a lot alike," I said.

James laughed again, "Don't tell either of them that. They hate each other. Reg is still part of the 'family'," James explained again.

"Oh, I see. Does Reg have the charm Sirius does?" I asked out of curiosity.

"Oh, yeah. Big player," he put extra emphasis on the word 'big', and then chuckled at what must have been an old memory.

"Okay, I have a chick lined up in a half an hour! Can we get this over with?" Reg finally said, frustrated.

"Fine, fine," James said. "Ms. Evans, do you wish to give the ridiculously long speech?"

"Why, I would thoroughly enjoy that!" I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm, but I continued with the speech anyway.

"Okay, you have a list of what's off limits before you. You also have a list of times and dates you will be patrolling the corridors in the castle. You cannot give people detention "just for the heck of it"." I quoted from what James and Sirius had said when Remus became prefect. Why wasn't Remus Head Boy? Right, the speech. "You will have to communicate with one another. The list of prefect rules is there; they are all self-explanatory. You will be patrolling the corridors in the train on the way. Take about a half and hour intervals, and then get another set of prefects to take the next hour. Any questions?" I asked, finally finished.

Reg's hand twitched into the air just enough to notice before he asked, "Why do you always turn Potter down? Is he really that bad? I know he hangs out with my brother, but, what's it about him that you just seem so repulsed by?" I was seriously getting annoyed with this kid. I would definitely be mentioning this to Sirius.

"Hate to sound childish, but mind your own business. Any prefect related questions?" I asked, making myself more specific. "Okay then, you can leave." They all made their way out slowly.

"Sirius' brother is a pain in the-." I started to say on the way back to our compartment when Sirius himself interrupted me.

"What'd he do now?" He asked.

"Oh, nothing really. Just pissed Lils off," James told him, smirking at my still angry expression.

"How? Wait, where'd you see him?" Sirius asked.

"By saying words. Now if you don't mind, I'm starving," James said, shoving his friend out of the way to get back to the compartment.

"Wait, where was he?" Sirius called after his friend.

"Lily! The badge looks great! Oooo, and James! Two badges? How do you do it boy?" Shay asked with fake admiration as we walked in.

"Well, I'm a Potter. My dad was the same way," James said boastingly.

"Oh, your dad was a prat until sixth year until he finally deflated his head enough so other people could be around him?" Sonya asked without having to look up from her book. The book was reflecting the glare James gave her. The rest of us were laughing at James' attempt to glare at her.

"James!" Sirius screamed.

"Sirius!" James bellowed back.

"Where'd you see my brother?"

"He's a prefect," James said as though it were obvious.

"Him? A prefect? How?" Sirius asked.

"I don't know Sirius, I don't choose em, I just control em," James said, shoving a chocolate frog into his mouth.

Sirius scowled and kept to himself a little more the rest of the way. Nothing really happened after Sirius blew up the train. We got to the carriages, which I happen to know are pulled by thestrals which only people who have seen death can see.

Since we can't fit eight in a carriage, we did two groups of four: James, Sonya, Remus, and me, and Sirius, Shay, Yvonne, and Peter. I was assuming that Yvonne was having an awful time having to talk to Peter the entire way up, considering I was certain Sirius and Shay couldn't resist snogging another minute.

When we got into the carriage, this particular one being able to hold six, we found two people already sitting there. One was a girl in our year, Alice. She was very nice, but too quiet to really get to know. She had a boyfriend last year, but he left because he was in his seventh year. He was Frank. I felt bad for Alice, now she didn't have anyone. She was just sitting in the carriage reading a book.

The second was a sixth year boy, Xenophilius. He was just plain weird. He also didn't have many friends, but he never looked lonely.

"Hey, can we take those?" James asked the two.

Xeno looked up at us, smiled, and nodded. I found it strange that his eyes lingered on Sonya for a few extra seconds, but didn't think much of it. I walked in and sat next to Alice, Sonya next to me.

"Hi, Alice," I said to her smiling, "Did you have a nice summer?"

She looked up and smiled back. "Yeah, Frank and I hung out most of the time," she told me, then looked at the others. "Are you finally getting along with James Potter?" she asked with teasing shock.

The question caught me off guard, but I didn't think much of it, "Yeah, I was kinda stuck with him this summer and the Marauders are friends of ours now. Strange, huh?" I asked, seeing her bemused grin.

"Yes. How were your summers?" she asked the others.

"Good. Lily has the most eventful though," James said with a cooked grin.

"Really? What happened?" Alice asked, fascinated.

"James, you seem to be keen on telling the story. Why don't you?" I asked him.

He grinned, "Well, we're almost at the school, so I can't add too much detail. Why don't I just sum it up. Lily here fainted about four times; got kidnapped a few times, granted most of them were by us. Anyway, she nearly got killed by a psycho maniac, and even ran down the street nude," James said as though it were seriously entertaining.

"Really? Who was going to kill her? What happened?" I had never heard Alice talk to anyone for long periods of time, and I was sure she was a nice girl, but I was glad that we had just stopped in front of the school and that we could stop talking now.

"Sorry Alice, Yvonne has been stuck in a compartment with Peter, and Shay and Sirius were most likely snogging the whole time. We really have to go save her. Lily will tell you at the feast or tonight, I don't know what Dumbledore has planned for the heads yet," Sonya explained. Sonya my lifesaver…

"Oh, okay," Alice, said, looking a little crestfallen that the conversation had ended. "Oh, and Lily? Congrats on making head." I smiled to her. She really was a nice girl, even if there was one thing I didn't want to talk about, I understand that when you tell someone you almost died, people feel the need to know how.

"Thanks Alice. I'll definitely fill you in on my summer later," I called to her. And I headed off to find Yvonne.

We found her banging her head against the side of a carriage say "Why, why, why?" over and over. We laughed, and then noticed Peter standing next to her, blabbing away about, _the upsides of being an animagus?_ This boy is definitely crazy. He isn't even an animagus, how would he know what the upsides were?

"Hey, Yvonne, cut it out. How was the trip?" I asked grinning.

She glared at me and then said sarcastically over Peter's still talking voice, "Wonderful!"

"Good, let's go. Sorry Pete, see you at the table!" I called as I grabbed my friend's arm and led her to the Great Hall.

"So how was your ride go?" Yvonne asked. I caught the jealousy in her tone.

"Okay, Alice and Xeno were there. Alice talked to us for a while, she probably will end up sitting with us, do you mind?" I asked, hoping the answer was no.

"I guess not. Why is _she_ sitting with _us_?" Yvonne asked. For some reason it was like she and Alice held a grudge over something. Maybe I'm imagining it. I can look into it later.

"Because James got her intrigued by my summer, particularly the part where I "almost died". Plus, I feel bad for her, she doesn't have many friends, and now she doesn't even have Frank," I told my friend.

"Aren't you an angel, Lily!" Yvonne said sarcastically.

"I like to think of myself that way," I said smiling and walking ahead of the other, slower, girls.

We were some of the first at the table, and we got seats toward the end, positioning ourselves as far away from the teachers as possible. We did this because we were positive the Marauders would want a small opening prank, and they don't want to be caught. Not that it matters because any teacher in their right mind would know who it was.

I looked up at the table and noticed some new people sitting there. There were two new teachers. I recognized one of the new teachers as our old Charms teacher's daughter. She looked really strict, and her jaw seemed unusually stiff. She wasn't going to be one to mess with. And yet I was sure the Marauders couldn't wait until her calss.

The other new teacher was, well, he looked flat out strange. He was wearing about eight layers, covering from his feet to his nose, plus a hat that covered his entire head. All that showed were his eyes and a little flesh surrounding his eyes. I could tell this was going to be an interesting year for our classes already…

The Marauders still hadn't shown up when they started the sorting. The sorting ended, giving Gryffindor four new boys and three girls. We had just started eating when the Marauders, along with Shay, walked in, fashionably late. They walked straight to us at the very end of the Gryffindor table, and Dumbledore smiled at them, and continued to eat his food.

"Yum, I'm starved!" Sirius exclaimed when he got within a few feet from the table, causing mild laughter to break out. He sat down and looked at us, "What's Alice doing here?"

"Thank you, Sirius Black," Alice said in a bitter sarcasm.

"She's sitting with us, I invited her," I added, seeing the words Sirius might've said to her if I hadn't.

"I see," he said a little bitterly. James smiled at Alice, as did Remus. Peter was still talking about being a rat. I rolled my eyes at his stupidity. Sirius put a silencing charm on him, and continued eating his food, not looking as worried as he had seconds before.

"So, Lily, what happened this summer that you almost dies from?" Alice asked. I explained my summer in detail to her, and just as I finished, the meal was over. I had acquired quite an audience by this time, but Dumbledore of course didn't have trouble getting their attention back.

"Just a few last minute announcements. The Forbidden Forest is, as always, out of bounce, for those of you whose mind seems to _forget_ this fact," Dumbledore's eye drifted to Sirius for a millisecond, and then he continued, "If you need help getting around, or help of any kind, our Head Boy and Girl, James Potter and Lily Evans are there to help you, and the Prefects will always be around. The Quidditch captains should start organizing when they will hold try outs so they can start practicing as soon as possible.

"As some of our returning students may have noticed, we have some new teachers. Professor MinervaMcGonagall will be taking post as the Transfiguration teacher and Professor Hanlinfyfe will be the new Defense against the Dark arts teacher." Dumbledore began clapping, and a few students joined in, but many were laughing. Most likely about Professor Hanlinfyfe's name, or appearance.

"You will get schedules in the morning, for now, get some rest. Though I would like to see my two heads for a moment," Dumbledore finished.

Everyone got up and started walking to their common rooms. James and I were trying to walk to Professor Dumbledore, but moving against the crown isn't easy, and we didn't get to him for several minutes.

"Professor?" James said when we were close enough.

"Yes?" he asked.

"You, er, wanted to talk to us?" James asked.

"Ah, yes! Being heads, you have your own common room. It's in the left high tower behind the portrait of the rabbits. The password is candy cane. Tell it to the smallest rabbit," Dumbledore told us.

"So, does this mean we have to stay in our own common room from now on?" I asked, sad that I wouldn't be able to see my friends without sneaking in.

"Of course not! The room is there, but you can use the Gryffindor common room if you choose. Your four posters are still in you dormitories. Just think of this as an added bonus," Dumbledore said smiling. I was relieved.

James and I bade Professor Dumbledore goodbye, and walked off to the Gryffindor common room, realizing we can't just leave our friends hanging. We agreed we'd try out the new common room on our free period after breakfast tomorrow morning.

We walked in, and a smiled and waved as James went to sit with the other Marauders by the fire. My friends were definitely in our dormitory, as were everyone else. He smiled back, waved, and walked off.

I walked up the stairs and was surprised to see all of my friends passed out along the five beds. I walked over, got into my own bed, putting Yvonne onto Shay's, and slept like a log. Not even realizing I was to wake up in the morning with one, huge problem…

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**Review please! (:**


	2. Big Bad Pranks and My Brothers

**Thank you: EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, prongsies.lady, cherrykisses21, kadygal, love.ron.w.75, fishysquishums, and LILYandJAMESareCUTE! **

**Chapter 2: The Big Bad Prank And My Brothers

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I woke up late the next morning, but before Sonya, Shay and Yvonne. I got dressed, and woke the others up. They took too long to get ready, so I left without them.

When I got to the bottom of our staircase, James Potter was standing, waiting for me.

"Ready?" he asked. What did I look like, superwoman? Of course I wasn't ready. I hadn't even eaten.

"No, I need to eat first," I told him. He sighed. "What?" I asked him playfully.

"I want to see it!" he whined.

I laughed, "We will see it, just after I eat. Or you can go now, and I can meet you there," I suggested.

He thought about it before deciding that he could live with my idea, and promised to wait for me in our common room. I was almost out the portrait hole, when Alice was by my side.

"Hello, Lily. Mind if I join you? Or are you sick of me like your friends seem to be?" she asked, sounding a little sad.

"No, it's fine. Don't pay attention to Sirius or Yvonne. Or Peter, and sometimes Shay. Only listen to Sonya, Remus, James, and me," I told her, we both laughed, and headed down together.

It turns out Alice and I have a lot in common. One of her parents was a muggle, so she knew about all the muggle music. We both had a strong liking for rock music, and we both liked fictional muggle stories. I was really enjoying Alice's company. It was when we finally reached the Great Hall that we heard noise.

Not just the noise of people talking and eating. People were screaming. We both ran to see what the commotion was about, only to see all of the Slytherins covered in a sticky substance, sprinkled over with what looked like bugs.

The girls from every house were standing on the tables because the bugs were spreading. The first year Slytherins didn't know what was happening, and a few were crying. Most of the other houses were chuckling silently, except for one person sitting at the Gryffindor table, laughing like there was no tomorrow.

"Sirius Black!" I screamed as I stormed over to him.

He looked up at Alice and me and managed to control himself, "Hello, Lily-flower! Like my prank?"

I glared at him, "No I do not! You can't go around doing stuff like this! And to first years? They don't even know why you are smothering them with, what did you use?

He smiled up at me, "It's something I made in Potions Class in fourth year."

"Well you can't smother them with that and bugs!" most of the Great Hall was watching our argument now. They probably wanted to see what Lily would do as head girl when her temper took control.

"Oh, they had it coming to them. Even the first years," Sirius waved his hand around as if it were a laughing matter.

"This is not a funny joke, Black! A week of detention, and help clean this up!" I ordered.

"You don't control me!" he bellowed, standing up now, towering over me by quite a few inches.

"I'm head girl, I can hand out detention to those who deserve it!" I yelled back at him, letting him know that our height difference didn't intimidate me.

"But you can't tell me to clean this up! That's not your job!"

I glared at him, "I have things I have to go do, have a nice detention! Oh, and even if I can't tell you to clean it up, Dumbledore can!" I added, turning on my heel and heading to the door to leave as I saw Dumbledore approaching behind Sirius, knowing that my work was done.

I heard him growl, and mutter something under his breath. What he muttered I couldn't fully catch, but it sounded like an insult. He was definitely insulting me. When I was out of the room, I felt my eyes burning with fresh, hot tears.

It was from what he said. I didn't even know what he said, but it hit me hard. It was just like the way we used to be: enemies. I was alone because Remus and Alice were restraining Sirius from hurting someone. From hurting me.

Over the summer my relationships with all of the Marauders changed. Remus is a closer friend than ever, Peter is, well, Peter hasn't changed much, James is a friend, maybe closer than a friend, but Sirius was more of a brother, a protector.

I wanted to run back into the Great Hall and hug Sirius telling him I wouldn't give him a single detention, but then I would be abusing my authority as Head Girl. I walked away, up to where my new common room was. I was sure James would be concerned when I walked in, my face being tearstained and all.

I walked up each floor in a daze. When I got to the portrait, I said the password, and stepped in.

It was amazing to say the least. It was completely red and gold, us both being in Gryffindor. The room was quite large, and had a fireplace you would imagine in a fairytale. In front of the fireplace, sat a small couch and an armchair, along with a small side table. Against the back wall were a table and two chairs. There was an enormous window behind the table and chairs that had a perfect view of the lake and Quidditch pitch.

I stood there for a few seconds, taking it all in. That was when James appeared out of a doorway. That was when I noticed the two doorways on either side of the room. One said Head Boy in gold letters, the other Head Girl.

"Hey, pretty amazing, huh?" he asked, looking around the room again. I nodded. And as soon as he looked at me, his face changed exactly the way I thought it would.

"You were crying," that was a statement, not a question, "Why?" he asked automatically. "No, wait. That was the wrong question. Who did what this time?" he corrected.

I smiled faintly at the way he put it, "Nobody did anything," I told him, hoping my voice didn't sound as corny as it did in my head.

"Don't lie to me. You really can't," he said smiling, "Now tell me what happened or I shall be forced to use extreme measures."

"I told you, nothing happened," I said, even more inconvincibly, if that was possible.

"Okay then," he said, walking toward me, "I guess I'm being forced with extreme measures." He stood in front of me. Swiftly and quickly, he picked me up and lifted me over his shoulder, and carried me to the couch. There, he threw me down and tickled me mercilessly.

I, being uncontrollably ticklish, was squirming so much, that within a few moments, I fell over the edge of the couch, taking James with me. I heard him grunt as his back hit the floor, then again when I landed on top of him.

I was only lying there for a few seconds before I realized how awkward it must look, even if nobody else was there. I scrambled to stand up, and ended up slipping on his robe, falling on top of him again, forcing him to let out another grunt.

"Sorry!" I said hurriedly, struggling to get off of him. This time I decided to just kneel next to him, and he slowly sat up.

"It's okay. It's not your fault you're clumsy," he said with a grin.

"Hey, I didn't mean to. You should blame yourself; you were the one to tickle me," I told him, struggling to defend myself.

"Okay, okay. You are a clumsy person, and I forced you to be one. Happy?" he asked. I nodded, and he continued with the subject I was hoping he lost interest in. "So what really happened to you?"

I sighed in defeat, seeing no way to get out of it, "I gave Sirius detention for pulling a horrid prank on the Slytherins. Then we had a shouting match, and now he hates me," I recited my sad tale.

James thought for a moment before saying, "I'm sure he doesn't…"

I cut him short, "He does. On the way out he called me, well, I don't exactly know what he called me. But it was definitely an insult. There was something about me being a goody-two-shoes, and then a few swears."

James face changed drastically, "He what?" he nearly screamed. Oh boy, not the right thing to tell him.

"Please don't get mad at him! I- I shouldn't have given him detention! You're probably right, he didn't mean anything by it after all!" I tried to calm James down, but nothing seemed to work.

"I'm sure he said it because he was angry, he can't control his words when he's angry. But I'm still going o kill him," James said in a murderous tone.

"Oh, please don't! Why do you have to?" I asked, trying to delay him to see if it would calm him down.

"Because he hurt you, I can see it!" he was getting up, and I was getting desperate.

I followed him as he began to walk to the door. "But, if he really didn't mean it then you don't have to kill him!"

He stopped for a moment, and I nearly ran into him. "Fine, I won't kill him. But I will injure him badly!" he said, walking again.

"But," I couldn't think of anything that would have stopped him. Then it clicked. I grabbed at his wrist, and attempted to spin him around. He turned, still a murderous look in his eye. I reached up, and I pulled his lips down to mine. It was the only way I could think to calm him down.

I would deny for eternity that I enjoyed this, but it was true. When he kissed me back, everything seemed to fall into place. When we broke apart, I finally realized how much I needed oxygen.

We were both still breathing heavy when he asked, "What was that for?"

"I needed some way to calm you down. Please, he's your best friend, your brother, and I'm sure he will come to his senses eventually. Just, please don't hurt him," I begged.

He looked down at me for a moment before nodding. "Okay, I won't harm him in any way. But, I am at least going to lecture him about this."

I thought about it briefly and didn't see anything bad that could come of it, "I can live with that," I told him smiling.

"Why does it mean so much to you anyway? I would never hurt him too badly," James informed me. I knew this already, and was unsure of why I had been so, protective.

"I, I guess I was thinking of him as my," I felt myself blush for saying it, "brother. We had a fight, but I didn't want anything to really happen to him."

James smiled. "So Sirius is both you and my brother now? But we aren't related in any way?" James asked.

"I guess so. Is that a problem?" I asked.

"Well, I just don't know if I feel like sharing my brother with anyone. And what would the Sirius who's your brother do if he found out about what you just did?" James asked grinning.

"Well, I just don't think you have a choice about sharing, and I think that he would murder you and I'd have to find some way to stop him," I told him, grinning back. "Let's go get food, I'm starving!"

"Deal, as long as you don't distract him like you did me, I'm happy. And let's eat in the kitchens, Sirius will be there, and I think we should work this out now."

"Okay then, the kitchens it is!" I said and we set off for the kitchens.

When we finally got there, James was right. Sirius was sitting there. He looked up at us, and glared at both of us, as if James hanging out with me was some sort of awful violation of their friendship.

I couldn't take seeing Sirius mad at me. I felt even worse now that I knew he was angry with James and it was my fault. He stood up. He began to walk to the door. James was about to stop him when I threw my arms around his neck and hugged him. He seemed shocked at first, and I felt the hot tears slide down my face. He slowly patted my back.

He stayed there until the tears came to an end, when I didn't have any left. It was like he could feel the tears, which now he could because the shoulder of his shirt was soaked. I don't think he trusted me to stand on my own. I don't think I would've trusted myself to stand on my own.

I finally got control of my breathing and said in his ear, "I'm sorry that I had to do that, I'm sorry I got you mad at me, and I'm terribly sorry that I got you angry with James."

He laughed and pulled away, "Lily-flower, I realize that it wasn't your fault, and I'm very disappointed to say that I thought that I could get away with more by taking advantage of being your friend. I guess, as much as I hate to say it, I deserve detention," A fake shiver went through him as he said that, and I laughed.

"Are you two finished now? All better?" James asked impatiently from behind us.

I turned to him, forgetting he was there in the first place. "Yeah, I think so," I said, and Sirius nodded.

"So what brought you down here, me or the food?" Sirius asked as he sat down.

"Both," James said, sitting down next to Sirius. I took a seat across from the two of them, and a house elf came to find out what we wanted. After we ate, we headed to our classes. I was just glad that I didn't have to fight with any of my friends, or brothers, nay longer.

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**Review?**


	3. Falling in Love With a Chipmunk

**Thanks to: **_kadygal,__prongsies.lady, He'sAPirate, LILYandJAMESareCUTE, _and _EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse. _

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**Chapter 3: Falling in Love with a Chipmunk**

It was our last class of the day; double Transfiguration. It was also out first Transfiguration class of the year; our first class with the new teacher…

All of the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs in the seventh year Newt Transfiguration class were gathered outside of the classroom. James, Sirius, Sonya, Shay, Remus, Alice, Peter and I were the only Gryffindors. And even I don't have a clue how Peter got into this class.

Many of the students from Hufflepuff were anxious of meeting the new strict teacher. But everyone was mostly afraid of being in a class with Sirius and a new teacher together.

The door to the classroom creaked open and Professor McGonagall allowed us to enter. The Gryffindors tried to sit in the back, leaving the front for the hesitant Hufflepuffs.

"Good afternoon and welcome to your seventh year Transfiguration class. I am Professor McGonagall," the Professor said professionally.

Professor McGonagall then gave us the same speech all of the other teachers had already. "You Newt years are very important. To pass this class you will have to pay attention, do the homework, and study hard for your exams."

"I highly doubt that," James said under his breath.

"What was that, Mr. Potter?" Professor McGonagall asked James as she made her way to the back of the room.

"Nothing Professor, I was just agreeing with you," James lied in a suck-up fashion.

I know teenagers better than that, Mr. Potter. And just so you know I have been warned by all of the other teachers to look you for the four Gryffindor boys. I am assuming that would be you four?" she indicated to James, Sirius, Remus and Peter.

"Yes ma'am!" Sirius chimed in. "But what you haven't heard is that Jamesie here happens to be the best in our year when it comes to Transfiguration."

"Really? We'll have to see about that later in class," she walked back to the front of the room and gave us her rules: no playing around, talking when the teacher is, etcetera, etcetera.

The second half of the class had just begun when she gave us our first assignment. "You are going to come up here and get a coat hanger and return to your seats. There you will attempt to change the coat hanger into a chipmunk. This should not be too difficult. I shall go around and watch as you each individually change your coat hanger. This is only so that I can get an idea of where you each stand in this class."

We all got up and took a coat hanger. Professor McGonagall walked around the room starting at the front. Everyone got the job done well enough. The hardest part was the tail, which nobody except James got to full bushiness.

"I'm impressed Mr. Potter," Professor McGonagall said as she smiled for what seemed like the first time since she came to Hogwarts.

"Hmm, I think I made him a little too fat," James inquired.

"Mr. Pettigrew, you're up," she told him. Peter was the last person to go, and the class was nearly over. Everybody, especially Sirius, was eager to go to dinner.

"Uh, I-I-I" Peter stuttered.

"Mr. Pettigrew?" Professor McGonagall asked him politely.

"I-I-I"

"Come on Pete," Remus encouraged.

"I-I-but I"

"Come on Peter!" Sirius said, infuriated.

"But I don't, I don't, I don't"

"Peter, just say the spell!" Sirius bellowed, murmurs of agreement scattering through the classroom.

"But I…"

"Just go!"

Peter looked around and a bead of sweat trickled down his forehead. He said a random word that had no ties to magic, his hand shaking everywhere as he said it.

"Abracadoodlebop!"

"What the-" some said from the crowd, not seeing the word as anything that they would ever think of saying.

"Where'd Sirius go?" James asked questioningly.

"Peter you idiot! What have you done? You made me a freaking chipmunk?" the squeaky voice came from the floor by my feet and I jumped backwards. Sirius, the talking chipmunk, made his way onto the desk.

A chorus of gasps issued from the class who were ravaging to get to the back for a closer look at what was happening.

"Lily, I liked your knickers!" Sirius called to me. I slapped the little chipmunk, sending Sirius flying off of the desk and onto the floor again.

"Hey! I was just saying! Now, what the bloody hell have you done to me?" Sirius bellowed.

James was laughing, along with many others. "Sirius, nobody can take you seriously, you know."

"And why is that?" Sirius asked in his little chipmunk voice.

"Because you sound like you got your voice put onto a voice recorder, then speeded up. It's just a high pitch jumble of words to us. Granted, they're extremely funny words."

"This isn't funny!" Sirius squeaked.

"Au contraire, it's quite funny," Remus said laughing behind his book.

While the rest of the class laughed at Sirius in his chipmunk form, James chipmunk went up and made small talk with Sirius. Or, at least that's what we thought he was doing until Sirius began to scream.

"James your chipmunk is gay and it's flirting with me and I am officially freaked out!" Sirius yelled, running as fast as his little chipmunk legs would carry him from the obese male chipmunk.

This little scene only made the class laugh harder.

"This is not funny!" Sirius bellowed as he continued to run from the overweight chipmunk.

"You're right Sirius, this is more than funny, it's hysterical!" James called after his friend. Sirius' little chipmunk hands struggled, but eventually managed to flip James off, making everyone laugh, if possible, harder.

"Enough!" Professor McGonagall called over the class. She quickly changed Sirius back into a human, and Sirius hugged her.

"Thank you! I'm forever grateful!" Sirius yelled into her ear.

"Class dismissed!" Professor McGonagall called to the class. "But, Mr. Pettigrew, How in the world did you get into this class?"

Peter shrugged and walked out the door of the half destroyed classroom.

As we walked to dinner, we talked about our Transfiguration class, and the new teacher, but mostly Sirius.

"You made a fantastic chipmunk!" James told Sirius, clapping him of the back.

"Shut up."

"You sounded like the chipmunks from the muggle entertainment!" Remus told him.

"Shut up."

"Yeah, he sounded just like Alvin from Alvin and the Chipmunks!" Lily agreed laughing.

"Shut your pie hole!" Sirius bellowed.

"Mmm, why are we talking 'bout pie?" Yvonne asked as she caught up to us and began to walk with us to dinner.

"Sirius is just cranky because he got turned into a chipmunk in Transfiguration class," I told me friend calmly.

"Whoa! Hold up, he got turned into a _chipmunk?_" Yvonne asked somewhat skeptically.

"Yeah, all thanks to Peter we got the most entertaining class of the year!" James told Yvonne laughing.

"That's really not saying much considering there has only been one week to this year," Sonya stated in an intelligent fashion.

"Actually, not even a week," Alice added.

"Whatever!" James told them both. "It was still pretty awesome! And hysterically funny!"

"Yeah, you can't even try to deny that it was funny, Sirius," I pointed out.

"Oh yeah, 'cause I go around all the time and try to be turned into a chipmunk so that another obese chipmunk can come over and hit on me!" Sirius hollered at us.

"It couldn't have been that bad!" I exclaimed.

"It was!" Sirius said childishly. We were all silent for a moment.

"Don't worry, no obese chipmunks will be getting a date with you while I'm around," Shay told him. He smiled at her and then lifted her into a kiss.

"Oy! We're standing in the middle of a corridor and you two are snogging!" James roared.

"Yeah guys, get a room if you wanna do that," Remus added.

Sirius broke the snogging session to look around the deserted corridor. Finally, his eyes locked on something. "Okay, see you guys later!" he called, dragging Shay along by the wrist.

"Where are you going, Sirius?" Remus asked as if he really didn't want to know.

"You said, "Get a room". Here's a closet, that's close to a room. See you guys later!" Sirius called before slamming the closet door shut.

"Immature," Remus muttered.

"Yeah, but he's the one missing out on dinner!" James called as he ran down the corridor toward the Great Hall. We all followed him and ate in peace, loud peace.

When we finally finished dinner, which somehow managed to take us an hour and a half, we walked along to the common room.

"I think I'm going to try out my new room in the Head's common room tonight," I told them.

"Aw, but Lily! We need you to entertain us!" Yvonne begged.

"I have too much Potions homework, I would be boring either way," I told her.

"Fine, but I want details in the morning," Yvonne told me.

"Of what? You've seen the room."

"I know, but I wanna know if it's comfortable enough to sleep in," Yvonne said, being random.

"Fine, I'll give you all the details on how comfortable my sleep was in the morning," I told them. Then I bade them goodbye and headed for the Head's common room.

"Hey, I thought I'd join you." I spun around to see James walked along just behind me.

"Oh, that's nice."

"Yeah, I really need you to help me on that Potions essay anyway."

"Oh," I said.

I sounded dejected, and he must have realized it because he quickly added, "And you know that I would want to spend time with you either way. I hope you knew that."

I gave him a half of a smile, and continued to walk along.

Why was I making such a big deal over this? It's not really like I care. Well, maybe I care, but it doesn't matter that much to me, does it? No, no it doesn't. Okay, maybe I'm a liar. Maybe it does mean something to me that he wants to be around me.

But does he really want to be around me, or is he just trying to cover up a blunder on his part. He says that he loves me, which would mean that he would want to spend time with me.

"Uh, Lily? Where are you going?"

"Huh?" I asked, spinning on the spot to face James standing at the portrait of bunnies.

"You just passed the entrance, and you've also been in a trance the whole way here. What's wrong?"

"Nothing, I just," I scratched my brain for some good excuse. "I was just in thought about tomorrow, it is the first weekend of the school year."

He looked me in the eye for a moment. "Okay. But are you sure you aren't angry with me? I know what I said earlier came out wrong, but, I don't know, it just came out that way."

"I'm not angry with you," I lied pathetically.

He sighed, "You know you really do suck at lying to me."

"I wasn't lying!" I blurted out far too quickly and nowhere near as convincing as I'd hoped.

He tried to smile at me, "Look, I'm sorry my words came out badly."

"I know that, I just, I don't know. I'm making a big deal out of nothing," I told him.

"No, I think it's my brain," he said inquisitively.

"What?" I was confused now.

"My brain seems to just blurt out random words whenever I'm around you. Haven't you noticed?"

"No!" I was almost laughing at the way he said it.

"Oh, well then I guess I feel stupid!"

I laughed along with him, "Don't feel bad, I'm the one who walked past the entranceway!"

We both laughed harder before a bunny interrupted us. "Sorry, but we can't stay up all night here. Could we hurry it along?

James told the picture our password, and we walked in, still giggling now and again.

We spent the night doing our Potions, or attempting to anyway, and mostly talking. We were both extremely tired at two in the morning, and we talked about going to bed many times. Needles to say, we never went to bed. Yet, somehow, I woke up in my enormous bed. Funny how strange things like this seem to happen all the time. Almost like there's an angel watching after me...

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**So, this took a while. I couldn't seem to write this. I had all the ideas, but I couldn't put it into words. I hope that this is good enough! Review if you liked! Don't waste my time telling me if you hated it, lolli**


	4. Quidditch Hurts

**Thanks: **_**EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, LILYandJAMESareCUTE, leanna, ProngsGirl-Kady, **__**YIsTheRunAlwaysGone, He'sAPirate, and**__** cookies94.**_

**I know; it took me forever all over again! Oh well, I got stuck and I didn't want this to be anything less than perfection. **

**Chapter 4: Quidditch Hurts**

I awoke late on Saturday morning. I dressed quickly and headed downstairs to shovel something into my stomach before I would go to watch the Quidditch tryouts.

I walked down the stairs out the door of the Head's common room and began to head to the Great Hall.

"Hey Lily-flower! I wasn't sure if you were ever coming out of there." I jumped from shock and spun around to see Sirius following me.

"Jeez, Sirius! Do you try to scare me to death?" I asked him as I began to walk down the corridor again.

"Eh, I'm pretty good at it though."

"Yeah, whatever. Why aren't you with your friends, or Shay?" I asked curiously.

"James is out on the pitch getting warmed up and all that, Remus is reading some book that seems extremely dull, and Peter is… I don't know where Peter is to tell you the truth," Sirius looked deep in thought and then shrugged.

"And Shay?"

"Well, she… we… she's not happy with me right now," Sirius said finally.

Oh great, what did he do now? "What did you do?"

"Well, on the first Friday of every year back at Hogwarts, we ordinarily go to the kitchens and talk, party a little, drink. You know Marauder stuff."

"You got drunk?" No wonder Shay was angry with him.

"It was nothing compared to Moony!"

"It doesn't matter, Sirius. Shay never liked drinking. Her dad died from drinking and smoking," I tried to explain.

"Really? She never tells me anything about her family…"

"Well, she's not very proud to have a dead alcoholic of a dad and a schizophrenic of a mom."

"A what?" Sirius was startled.

"Schizophrenic. She has schizophrenia. It a muggle thing."

"I thought that her family were wizards though."

"Her grandparents on her father's side were from wizarding descent. But her dad was a squib and her mum is a muggle."

"Wow. I don't know much about her, do I?" Sirius asked me.

"No, you don't. But I'll talk to her for you, and maybe I can convince her to tell you more about her past. And for her to forgive you," I told him.

"That sounds good I guess. Now come on, I have to be at the Quidditch tryouts!" Sirius called as he ran down the hall.

"Why? You aren't even on the team!" I called as I ran after him.

"But McGonagall wants to see me commentate the Gryffindor and Slytherin tryouts today to make sure I can do it!"

"Oh, Can I eat first?"

"Can you eat fast?"

"Yes!"

"Fine, to the Great Hall!"

We ran to the Great Hall bursting through the doors panting. I found the first empty seat and dragged Sirius to it. We both shoveled food into our mouths and were off again.

Sirius ran up to the commentator's box, and I to the stands where I saw Sonya talking to Remus, who were both holding books. Yvonne looked ready to kill, and then I saw Peter sitting beside her talking aimlessly. Alice looked out of place in the group. She looked awkward in her seat.

"Hey!" I called as I neared my friends.

"Hey," Sonya said in an autopilot answer.

"Hi Lily," Alice said sheepishly.

"Thank goodness you're here! I'm going to murder him!" Yvonne said in my ear as she approached me.

I chuckled softly. "How're the try-outs going?" I asked.

"Okay. Gryffindor isn't looking too strong. We lost too many people from just last year," Yvonne informed me.

"How'd Shay do?" I asked her.

"Horrid. She nearly fell off of her broom. But I think that James will put her on the team because he knows her potential and everything. We just have to make sure she's going to play good. So we need to get her and Sirius back together."

"Yeah, I told Sirius I would help him with that."

"How are you planning that adventure?" Yvonne asked me.

"I don't know. I figure I'll just talk to her."

"About what?" she asked skeptically.

"I don't know! I'll make it up as I go along."

"Okay Lily."

"I can do it!" I shouted.

"Again, okay Lily." Yvonne was barely done her sentence before Sirius' voice boomed over the pitch.

"And it looks like captain James is going to have a tough time this year. The team isn't looking strong at all."

"Black!"

"Yes, Professor?" Sirius asked casually.

"Will you _try_ to focus on the positives please?"

"Oh, yes Professor, of course Professor. Positives, positives… Wow, look at James go! He must be angry the way he's chasing after that kid!"

And then James' scream made it to us in the quiet stands. "I'm going to murder you, you little son of a…"

"Potter!" McGonagall bellowed. "What do you think you're doing?"

James flew to the commentators box with fury in etched into his face. "That little punk of a Slytherin is here to see what the team looks like, a spy, and to insult us the whole time."

"And you thought beating him up would stop him?" McGonagall asked.

"That's not why I did it, Professor," James' voice had a sour edge to it.

"Then what was, Mr. Potter?" McGonagall's voice matched James' edge.

"Well, Professor, I don't like it when freaky little twits of Slytherin second years go around insulting my friends and I!" James' bellow was heard, and everybody was in still shock.

"And what do you mean by that, Mr. Potter?"

"Yes, Mr. Potter, tell us what you meant by that!" Sirius interjected.

"Shut up Black!"

"Yes Professor."

"I'm just saying that I don't like it when the punky Slytherin starts insulting one of my good players because she's having an off day," James glared at Sirius momentarily.

"You said he insulted your friend_s_ and _you_, though, Mr. Potter."

"Yes, because while insulting my _friend_, Shay, he insulted my _friend_, Lily, leading to an insult to _me_ about why I chase after her when she's a- a- I'm not even going to say it."

There was a moment of silence in which Sirius apparently couldn't pass up saying something, "And we'll be back with the epic fight of teacher versus student after the break." The few people in the stands laughed a little at Sirius' comedy.

Both McGonagall and James told Sirius to shut up at the same time, and James made his way back to the pitch.

The tryouts were okay after that. James still had a rise in temper, and the team wasn't looking good at all, but Sirius was perfect commentator. Well, everyone except McGonagall thought so…

We sat on the stands watching the Slytherin tryouts, mainly because Sirius was commentating, which turned out to be quite the show.

"Look at the seventh year fly! Has he ever been on a broom in his life? And why's the captain got a Hufflepuff in the tryouts? He obviously isn't very observant. I mean, you could tell that chick's a Hufflepuff by looking at her robes, but this moron couldn't figure that out…"

"Black!"

"What now?" Sirius asked as though he were being interrupted from a serious discussion.

"You can't insult the other team, Black," McGonagall tried to say calmly.

"Well, maybe if the other team had a brain I wouldn't have to insult them," Sirius said in a tone that clearly was meant to state the obvious.

"You cannot insult the other team!"

"I don't see why not though. Their team is a bunch of…" We didn't figure out what Sirius was going to say because McGonagall cut him off, but I'm sure you can use your imagination. Or, maybe you shouldn't…

"Black if you insult this team one more time or talk back to me at all for the rest of the day we will find somebody else to take your place as commentator!" McGonagall bellowed in the loudest voice I had head all day.

"Okay, okay! And the Slytherin's are looking great out there with their Hufflepuff. And look at that girl! Wow can she fly into a wall or what folks?" Sirius said in a peppy euphoric tone. The now crowded stands burst into laughter.

"Black!"

"What? Nothing negative there Professor," Sirius said innocently. What a thought; Sirius being innocent. That'll be the day…

"Black I don't like your attitude," McGonagall said.

"Why not? I thought I was doing a nice job. I was happy and everything!" Sirius exclaimed.

"Black, if you don't stop acting…" But a bludger to the commentator's box silenced McGonagall and the rest of the crowd.

"Sirius!" Shay was the first to scream. She, James and I bolted to the commentator's box closely followed by the rest of our friends.

"Oops! I'm sorry Professor! You know how new players can be," the Slytherin captain said in a completely false voice.

"You hit that bludger!" Shay screamed. "You hit a bludger at the commentator and blame it on your teammates! You're a pathetic excuse for a human being!"

"What's that?" the Slytherin asked, edging nearer to Shay. I attempted to stand between Shay who was now kneeling over Sirius, and the Slytherin captain. The Slytherin easily shoved me aside. You can see this leading to a problem.

"Don't shove her!" James shouted, advancing on the Slytherin.

"And what'll you do Potter?" James whipped out his wand, then the Slytherin his.

"Enough! You and I shall be heading to the Headmaster's office, Blair. The rest of you can take Mr. Black to the hospital wing.

And so we did. We sat and waited for him to wake up in intervals, Shay staying the entire time. Sirius finally began to stir when we were all in the crowded room with him.

Sirius mumbled a little before he screamed, "Ahh! Psychotic werewolves are taking over my brain! Help!" Remus looked taken aback by this statement for some reason.

Then Sirius screamed again. "No! No Mr. Werewolf, don't feed me to the fat rats in the dungeon!" Most of us were in hysterics by Sirius' strange behavior.

Shay ruined the moment by shaking Sirius. "Sirius! Wake up! Sirius!"

"Mmm?" Sirius said sleepily. "Wha's da matter?"

"Sirius!" Shay through her arms around his neck.

"Whoa! What's wrong? Where'm I?" Sirius asked looking around.

"That bloke of a Slytherin hit a bludger at you. He was a right jerk. I heard he might be taken off of the team though," James informed him.

Sirius chuckled a little, "I'm glad my injury is for the good of the team."

"Sirius?" Alice asked. Sirius looked around to her. "What's your problem with werewolves?"

"What?" Sirius was flabbergasted.

"You said something about psychotic werewolves taking over your brain. And then they were feeding you to fat rats."

"I-I guess it was just some bad dream thing that I must have had." Sirius lied.

"Okay then. If you insist," Alice said. I couldn't help but think that she knew something that we didn't.

"Well, I'm starved. Let's go eat."

"Sirius, you aren't supposed to leave." Soya told him.

"Since when do I listen to adults?" he asked her. Sonya simply rolled her eyes at him. As we walked out, I heard Remus say very quietly, "I resent that dream of yours."

So? Not my best? Funny? I know it's taking me forever to update this. I'm sorry. But basketball is almost over, and my mum wants to get a computer soon. Prays to get a computer Please forgive me. It will be another longish wait. Love, lolli


	5. Water Balloon Fight

**Thank you: **_ice cream, EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, He'sAPirate, fictiouswrighter, and Cherrykisses21._

Chapter 5: 

Sirius got himself into trouble by leaving the hospital wing early. They sent him back to spend the night. That's when I talked to Shay. Apparently she was worried sick, but hasn't gone back to dating Sirius. She's so stubborn!

Flashback 

"_Shay?" I asked as I looked around to see her alone. _

_She turned to look at me. "Oh, hi Lily,' she said cheerily. "What'd you want?" _

"_Oh, nothing." _

"_Lily, I'm saying this 'cause I'm your friend. And 'cause everyone else has told you and it won't go through your brain. You suck at lying." _

"_Yeah?" I questioned to keep her occupied._

"_Oh yeah," she replied. "So what brought you here?" _

"_Er, I talked to Sirius this morning…"_

_She cut off my sentence. "I really don't want to talk about Sirius and our relationship Lily," she told me sternly._

"_I know. I- okay then," I decided I wouldn't push her into telling me. She would blurt it out if I just stared conversation with her. "So did James choose everyone for the team yet?"_

"_Yeah," her face lit up as if this were something interesting that she wanted me to ask her. "We are having our first practice tomorrow. James really couldn't've picked a better team. I mean, we aren't perfect, but we aren't all that bad. I mean, once I get to playing back to my standards we should be good."_

"_Really? Who'd he pick?" I asked my friend._

"_Well, James and I are the chasers along with that fifth year girl Kerry. Beth, you remember her right? Well she's our seeker. She's really good! Wait til you see her! Shane is keeper still. And that sixth year girl, Tessa, she's a beater. She's one of the middle children of nine. All of her siblings excluding two are boys. You couldn't find a tougher, better fit for a beater!" Shay rambled on to me._

"_Who's the other beater?" I asked counting the people she had mentioned in my head. _

"_That sixth year boy Sonya and Yvonne dated at the same time."_

"_Croy? The guy with the weird name?" I questioned._

"_That's the one! Remember how confused he was when Sonya and Yvonne were beating each other up over him? You would think he knew he was dating two girls at the same time," she told me half in a dazed concentration on the past. _

"_I agree. How brain-dead must you be?" _

"_Brain-dead?" Shay asked skeptically._

"_Yes, what's wrong with brain-dead?" _

"_Nothing. Did you make it up yourself?" she asked in a mocking tone._

"_No!" I said in a dignified way, though now we were both laughing so it really didn't matter. I hated turning the subject to awkwardness, but it was necessary. I promised Sirius. "Shay, please forgive him."_

_Shay's laughter ended and she glared at me. "No. He was drinking Lily!" _

"_But he didn't do it to hurt you! He's done it in the past!"_

"_But we weren't dating in the past!" she countered._

"_But you never tell him about your life! He didn't know about anything! About why you don't like drinking and everything! You can't blame him when it's your fault that you didn't tell him about anything!" I shot at her. Oh no, that came out wrong. No, no, no! Lily why are you so stupid!_

_Shay looked on the verge of tears. "Shay, I- that came out all wrong. You had…"_

"_Don't tell me that I was right in dumping him now!" she shot furiously at me. "Just because you caught your bad wording doesn't mean you take anything back. You're so full of lies I can't even tell the truth from you anymore!" she stood and glared at me before walking to the door and leaving me alone to wallow in my stupidity._

_End flashback_

So in other words, talking to Shay did nothing except make her stop talking to me.

"Hey Lily flower!" Sirius said cheerily as he walked toward me.

"Hey Sirius," I said. It sounded bad; I could hear the self-hatred in my tone.

"What's up?" he asked me in a concerned fashion. He really was a nice guy.

"Nothing really. I tried to talk to Shay and my temper took hold and now she won't talk to me and still dislikes you and probably hates herself," wow I sounded monotone.

"Oh, is that all?" Sirius said sarcastically.

I smiled in a way that told him I'm smiling because in any other situation that would've been funny but not now. "On the bright side she only dislikes you. She hates me at the moment. And I think it's getting through to her that she should take you back so I'd give her a week and she should be fine and ready to go out with you again."

"How, happy?" Sirius didn't sound happy.

We stood in an awkward self-pitying silence for quite some time before James came and rescued us from our own sorrow and despair.

"Wow you two look like hell." Okay, he didn't save us much.

"Thank you." Sirius said in a daze. James laughed at his friend and I smiled.

"So you're _proud_ to look like hell?" James questioned.

"Wait, what?" Sirius asked, snapping back to reality. James and I laughed as Sirius tried to remember what had been said.

"Never mind. What's up with you two?" James asked us.

"Shay hates me," I said blatantly.

"And me. Still," Sirius added.

"So she's still mad at you?" James asked and Sirius nodded. "That sucks." Sirius nodded in agreement. "Why does she hate you?" James asked, turning on me.

"Because I lost my temper while trying to get her to take Sirius back."

"I see," James said slowly. "Well let's go get something to eat. That always makes Sirius feel better." I smiled at James' attempt to cheer us up, knowing that it was a lost cause.

We got to the Great Hall in near silence. James attempted to make conversation a few times but gave up after we gave our one-word answers.

"Sirius?" James asked with a small grin playing over his lips. I knew that grin. I had seen it oh so many times while hanging out with Sev. That was the mischievous grin.

"Mm?" Sirius responded.

"Would you care to have some fun?" Sirius turned to look at his friend. He recognized the grin as well. Though, instead of being afraid for my welfare, Sirius grinned back.

"Why, what do you have in mind?"

"I just figured a water balloon fight would brighten your spirits," James said.

"But it's getting cold outside. Today especially!" I interjected.

"Oh, don't worry We wouldn't go through the trouble of gathering everyone outside when they're already so conveniently together in the Great Hall," Sirius said smirking.

"You wouldn't!" I yelped.

James grinned, "We are Marauders, of course we would do this. The real question is are you going to help us?" I looked at him skeptically.

"Come on Lily flower. Just walk over that boundary line separating the good from the bad. This once," Sirius encouraged.

"You know you really have a bad affect over me," I said, finally caving after seeing the two boys' faces.

James and Sirius' smiles grew wider as they got out their wands. "Okay, I'll make the balloons, James fills them with water and Lily flower can suspend them in the air and set them to move into the great hall on command at the same time," Sirius instructed.

"This'll be great!" James said as he filled the first of the balloons with water. I was surprised at how fast we had all two hundred balloons done. I guess it was a good thing to be fast considering we were standing just in front of the Great Hall doors and anyone could walk through and catch us at any given moment. For some strange reason the thought of getting caught was getting me more excited.

"Ready?" Sirius asked me. I nodded my head and he opened the doors to the Great Hall.

James then bellowed, "Introducing the first ever Great Hall water balloon fight!" Then I set the balloons loose. They flew toward people like targets.

"How'd you get them to chase people?" Sirius asked in awe as one particularly stubborn balloon chased Peter in circles.

"Simple, you just add an extra flick to your wand and say the spell slower," I told him as I watched my masterpiece.

I looked over to James who was soaking wet. "One of your dumb balloons hit me in the back of the head!" he complained. I giggled and Sirius nearly fell over laughing at James' soaked through shirt and sopping wet hair.

We all averted our gaze back to the Great Hall where chaos was brewing. Most of the balloons were gone, but a few balloons were determined to hit more than one person. And a few others couldn't decide whom to go after. Most of the balloons seemed to choose Peter. Why he was such a target for them, I didn't have a clue.

I watched Peter for a moment. He was screaming like a girl as he ran in random spirals. "Get them away from me!" He would yell. James and Sirius were definitely right when they say that pranking was fun. This was pure enjoyment. I wouldn't make a habit of it though.

I soon saw Dumbledore strolling toward us closely followed by Professor McGonagall.

"Hello Professors," Sirius said casually.

"Why?" Dumbledore asked.

"I don't know. It seemed boring in there. We were just trying to liven things up a bit," Sirius said. He was the master at sucking up to teachers.

"All three of you, detention," he said tiredly. He must get sick of telling them to stop their pranks.

"How'd that feel Evans?" Sirius asked.

"Evans? When did we decide to go back to a last name basis, Black?" I asked him.

"Oh, sorry Lily flower. I got lost in the moment," Sirius explained. "So how'd it feel?"

"Brilliant!" I told him smiling. "I mean, I'm not going to make a habit of it or anything and I'm not happy about getting detention but it was quite a bit of fun."

"Well note this day in the history books, Lily Evans enjoys pulling pranks!" James called to the hallway full of soaked people. For some reason they glared at us. Go figure!

Some of the last people through the doors of the Great Hall we a group of Slytherin boys. All of which glared at us as they walked by. Sev was one of the boys. He looked at me, looked into my eyes and shook his head scowling at me.

"Lily?" Remus asked as he walked out of the Great Hall closely followed by Sonya, Shay, Peter and Yvonne.

"Yes?"

"Why are you pulling ranks with them?" Sonya interjected.

"We had to replace Remus and we chose her," Sirius said jokingly. Shay glared at him and he cowered back a tiny bit.

"I don't know. James thought it would cheer us up because neither of us were very cheery," I reasoned.

"Why? What was wrong?" Sonya asked in that concerned mother sort of way.

"Nothing," I replied. "Nothing important."

"Are you sure?" she asked me.

"Yes, my dear mother I'm positive nothing important is wrong with me!" I said, my voice heavy with irony. "Speaking of mothers, mine is most likely waiting for that letter I promised. See you guys later!" I called over my shoulder as I walked down the hall back to my common room.

When I got into my bedroom, I sat in front of the window and looked over the Quidditch pitch. I was really a great view…

_Dear Mum,_

_How are you and Dad? How about Tuney? I hope you're well! _

_This year was going wonderfully. But Shay broke up with Sirius the other day and now refuses to talk to me because I tried to help get them back together. So that isn't the best, but we've been having a lot of fun aside from that. _

_The new teachers are okay. One is really strict and we haven't had the other yet. He looks a little on the strange side. Or a lot on that strange side._

_Sirius got turned into a chipmunk in the last Transfiguration class. Sonya and Remus still aren't going out. Tell Tuney she has two more weeks until she owes me twenty dollars. _

_Sirius is a great commentator; James' team looks good this year. Oh yeah, Sirius got hit with a bludger from the Slytherin team yesterday. Don't worry he's fine though. _

_Give my best regards to Mr. And Mrs. Potter! I love you,_

_Lily_

I reread my letter and went out to send it.

"Hey!" James called from the sofa.

"Yeah?" I asked, turning on the spot t face him.

"We have a meeting tomorrow with Dumbledore ad the Prefects and our detentions are the rest of the week at seven," he informed me.

"Okay, thanks," I turned to the door again.

"Oh! And the first Hogsmead trip is in two weeks," he added.

"Already? God this year is already flying by," I muttered.

"Yeah," he agreed. "You want to head to the common room with me? Sirius and Remus are waiting there and I'm sure Sonya and Yvonne are too."

"Sure, but I just have to send out this letter."

"Okay, we can stop on the way." We walked to the Gryffindor common room talking and laughing. When we walked through we saw quite a scene.

Shay and Sirius were screaming at each other, Sonya was chatting animatedly to Yvonne. Sonya also seemed to be in a daze, and Remus looked sour.

"What's up?" James almost had to yell to Remus to make himself heard.

"They're fighting over something stupid," Remus said.

"Well yeah, what's new there? I was talking about Sonya and Yvonne," James told him.

"Oh, them. Sonya was just asked to Hogsmead be Xeno and she said she'd go with him and now she's all excited," Remus said bitterly.

"Ah, that would be why you look like you swallowed a lemon also I assume?" James asked Remus.

"I am not jealous of Xeno Lovegood!" He shot at James.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah say what you want."

"I'm not!" Remus didn't sound dignifies though.

"Lily! Did you hear? Remus told you of course. I'm so excited!" Sonya dashed over to me and began to tell me everything.

"I thought you liked Remus?" I asked her under my breath.

"Yeah, well he refuses to ask me out so I might as well have some fun while I wait for him," Sonya told me.

"Isn't that kind of like using Xeno?" I asked her curiously.

"No!" She said quickly. "Well, I guess it is, but I at least want to have a good time in my last year here at good 'ole Hogwarts! This'll be one of the only times I've done something genuinely bad and not felt bad about it!" Sonya seemed excited about this.

"Okay, but try not to hurt him. You know how the school will make fun of him for ages if he got cheated on or something."

"Okay!" Sonya was still smiling like a crazed fool. I guess I'd have to just put up with her giddiness for the next few weeks…

**So. I'm sick and got to stay home from school and finally got this chapter done. The next chapter will be up sometime before Saturday (if all goes according to plan) because I'm doing a 30-hour famine and will need something to keep me busy on Friday. **

**I hope you liked it. I couldn't resist a water balloon fight. Grins evillyI have quite a few alerts on this story so I should get lots of reviews… lolli**


	6. Peeves is Evil

This is late

Okay, really, really late. My life was boring and I could submit a chapter a week, and then it went chaos in about a week. My great-grandmother died so I had to go to Canada, I (being the most procrastinaty person on the planet) shoved my History project to the last minute, and got really addicted to a website. I think I can handle this chapter-writing thing now. Sorry for the wait. Give my hell in your reviews, here's chapter 6!

**After the credits. Thank you: **_LILYandJAMESareCUTE, EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, ice cream, JesterBellsILove, Cookies94, prongsies.lady, sc12321, _**and last but not least**_ love.ron.w.75! _

Chapter 6:

I slept in the girl's dorm last night because Sonya insisted that I simply had to. It turns out she really just wanted to tell me more about Xeno. Not only did I get way too much information about Xeno Lovegood for a few years, but my bed in the girl's dorm was no where near as comfortable as my head bed… Wow I can rhyme in the morning! Oh well, it's early Sunday morning and I plan to sleep quite a bit more tonight. In my head bed.

I had a head meeting in two hours, then detention at seven tonight. I got up and got dressed in my Sunday, more comfy but still good looking, clothes. I quickly brushed my hair and went down to breakfast.

"Hello Lily!" I turned to see Alice following me down the stairs to the common room. I have run into somebody every morning this week while going to breakfast...

"Hey Alice. How have you been?" I asked her politely. I hadn't talked to her in a while, I realized.

"Okay, a little bored lately, but I've been okay. I've finished my homework for the next two weeks," she informed me.

"Really? So nobody's really keeping in touch with you?" I asked her, suddenly feeling remorse flood through my veins.

"No, nobody really likes me. You know how Sirius and Yvonne are. Remus has been reading lately, and Sonya talks to Yvonne constantly about her date with Xeno. James has been with you or Sirius, though Sirius has been alone most of the time over the past few days. And Peter tags along after Yvonne everywhere. Shay's just in her zone of emo-ness lately," Alice informed me with a saddened expression.

"I'm sorry Alice. I've been busy lately. I really want you to hang out with us more often," I told her.

"It's okay Lily. They won't like me either way…"

"I don't care if they like you or not, I'll make them like you," I cut in forcefully.

"You don't have to do that," she said in an embarrassed tone and expression.

"But I truly want to Alice. I feel bad that they've treated you this way and I actually do like you. I would feel so much better if you'd hang out with us," I said in my most sincere voice.

"Thank you, Lily. If it means so much to you, I'll hang out with you guys. I'm sorry for causing you all this trouble."

"There's no trouble at all Alice," I told her truthfully.

We were just nearing the Great Hall when Yvonne came out screaming, closely followed by Shay and Sonya.

"What's wrong?" Alice and I both asked them in a concerned fashion.

"Remus… he's gone mad!" Yvonne gasped out.

"What do you mean he's gone mad?" Alice asked.

"He's standing on the tables screaming for chocolate!" Sonya shrieked.

"What?" I nearly screamed. This didn't sound like Remus at all.

"We need to get James. Or Sirius," Yvonne said.

"What about Sirius?" we spun around to see Sirius and James walking towards us grinning.

"Great you're here! Remus' got mad!" Yvonne said again.

"He's screaming for chocolate!" Sonya informed the two boys.

They looked at each other briefly out of the corner of their eyes, "Again? He did that the summer after third year when his dad died!" Sirius whined.

"Well let's get this over with…" James said starting for the door with Sirius at his tail and the rest of us behind him.

Remus was actually on top of the table. I didn't actually believe that part but, alas, it is true. He's screaming at a first year to give him chocolate or he'll release the rabid werewolf on the little boy. What was he talking about? Rabid werewolf? This is very, very strange.

"Oh Remmy!" Sirius called to the temporarily silent friend. "Want some chocolate?" Remus looked over at the two boys, darted down the table to them and jumped off the table.

Sirius took Remus by one arm and James took Remus' other as they walked out of the Great Hall.

"You may resume you meal in peace," James called over his shoulder as he exited the Great Hall with his friends.

I looked around at the students and teachers in the Great Hall. The boy Remus had threatened was pale as a ghost and had a horrified expression on his face. Some of the fifth and sixth years were admiring the three boys' exit, and quite a few people were wondering if it was just a stunt. You never know what those Marauders are up to… The teachers, I noticed, looked like stone. They were motion and emotionless. It was quite a site. I wished I had a camera at this moment.

"Well, that was something you don't see every day," Yvonne said casually.

"I wonder what brought him to that. I mean, I know he likes chocolate, but why was he so… crazy?" Sonya asked.

"Chocolate's been known to console people and he's seemed a bit down lately. Maybe he needs it when he's in a rut," Alice suggested.

"He hasn't been in a rut!" Yvonne told Alice nastily.

"How would you know? You have friends around you to take your mind away from the world. I have nothing to do but look at the people around me! I have nobody that would cause a distraction for me. I've spent the past week watching all of you guys, I know you better than you seem to think I do!" Alice's height wasn't very intimidating, but she definitely caught Yvonne off guard.

Sonya, probably trying to avoid a fight, interjected, "What would have him in a state of depression either way?"

Alice had a glare to her eyes. I hadn't seen her this angry before. She always seemed so soft and sweet. It was nice getting to see Alice standing up for herself instead of letting herself be pushed around. "As if that isn't obvious," she snarled at Sonya.

Sonya looked taken aback. "What? Am I missing something that's going on here?"

"No, you missed the obvious! Not only are you using a guy for your own personal advantage, but you're hurting another, a friend, while using poor Xeno!" Alice said in a voice that was a normal volume but had such an intensity to it people next to us looked afraid for us.

"What are you getting at?" Yvonne asked Alice. She always was a bit of a ditz when it came to the obvious…

"You mean Remus is depressed because I'm going to Hogsmead with Xeno?" Sonya asked in an expressionless tone.

Alice nodded and turned away from Sonya. From what I could see, it looked like she was trying to calm her anger.

Sonya suddenly broke into a smile, "It worked! He's jealous! He's got to asked me out after I break up with Xeno after this Hogsmead trip!" I thought that she said this a tad too loud, but nobody seemed to notice.

Alice turned to Sonya with fury in her eyes, "You're just using him! You don't even want him! You're a bloody moron who wouldn't deserve Remus either way!"

"You're acting like you love Xeno Lovegood," Sonya accused. What had gotten into this girl lately? All of my friends; Shay's in extreme depression! She hasn't said anything in… a very long time!

"No, I love Frank and I always will. But I don't want to see anyone else get hurt by your own petty wants!" Alice told her forcefully.

Alice turned to walk away. I gave my friends a glance to see their expressions. Shay looked like a zombie, Sonya looked like one of those preppy girls that everyone hates from the movies, and Yvonne looked off in lala land. I shook my head at them and promised myself to look into Shay and talk to Sonya. I turned and followed Alice out of the Great Hall.

"Alice! Wait up, are you still hungry?" I asked, knowing that I was starving.

"Yes, but I'm not going back in there with them," she told me over her shoulder.

"I know that, but we could go to the kitchens," I suggested.

She turned to look at me with interest. "You know where the kitchens are?"

"Yeah, I mean, I'm a good student, but I couldn't resist checking it out after meeting a house elf cleaning the common room really late, or maybe it was really early, one day," I explained.

"Okay, lets go then. I always wondered if it was just a fib my cousins told me, but I still always wanted to go to the kitchens…" she explained to me on our way to the kitchens.

We ate in the kitchens and sat there for the remainder of the morning. When the time for the Prefects meeting came I bid Alice goodbye and left for the empty classroom we'd be holding the meeting in.

I was the first to arrive to Peeves, who was messing around as usual with the teacher's things. This was Hanlinfyfe's class, and from what I've heard he's very unorganized. He's also fidgety. Peeves would, of course pick him; he's an easy target.

"Out Peeves!" I barked at the poltergeist.

Peeves looked in my direction and smiled his evil, menacing smile. "But Peevsie no want to leave yet," he said in his irritating singsong voice.

"Just leave Peeves!" I ordered.

"Ne-ve-r-r-r!" Peeves cried as he flew around the room, flinging objects at me from every angle.

"Ow! Ahh! Peeves cut it-ow- out!" I screamed.

"Need some help?" a voice asked. I turned to see Sirius. No, it was Sirius' brother. It looked like Sirius at a glance, and when objects are pelting you, you could get them mixed up. But there was no missing the smirk on his face as he watched Peeves zoom around and throw objects at me.

"Ow! You think?" I asked him with heavy sarcasm.

"Well if you're going to act that way…" he started.

"Ow, okay, please help me!" I screamed. Peeves had just thrown a box at me, which opened on its way to me. I was pelted with little hollow glass balls, which shattered when they hit my skin.

"Hmm, after being disrespected I don't know if I want to…" he said in that cocky Slytherin drawl.

The pain around my body from the glass balls was excruciating. Glass was stuck into my skin and blood showed through my robes.

"Please help me!" I begged. I really didn't want to pass out and Peeves' objects were either getting larger, more painful, or both.

"What is going on here?" I recognized professor McGonagall's voice. "My dear lord what is happening? Peeves! Stop this nonsense at once or I'll send for the Bloody Baron!" she barked at Peeves. The Bloody Baron, why didn't I think of that? "Professor Dumbledore will be hearing about this." But Peeves was already zooming out of the classroom and cackling like mad down the corridor.

"Mr. Black, please escort Ms. Evans to the hospital wing at once," she told Regulus.

"Yes Professor," he said.

"I shall tell Mr. Potter you won't be here for the meeting," she informed me. I nodded weakly. Why is it always me? I mean, Peeves would do that to anyone, yet he continues to choose me. I'm accident-prone. Well, some people are worse. Like that fourth year Hufflepuff. I swear I see her trip over her robes (which are abnormally short) every day before breakfast and after lunch!

Anyway, I feel weak. Oh, I lost blood that could be it. I need to lie down quite badly right now. I wonder if we're almost there. I could just try to pay attention to where we are now. Then I would have to open my eyes though.

I opened my eyes slowly. Ah, headache! I'm going to keep my eyes closed from now on…

I don't really know how long I thought to myself before finally reaching the Hospital Wing. It seemed like ages! The nurse like person, a very tall thin woman, walked over to us immediately. Or, as far as I could tell with my eyes still closed she did.

"Good heavens! What's happened to you dear?" I heard her voice break through my head and erupt the awaiting headache within.

"Peeves…" But I didn't get to finish this sentence because the she just groaned and had me lead over to the nearest bed. It was quite comfortable, and if my head wasn't pounding I might have been able to get to sleep…

Wait, why am I not feeling pain from being hit with heavy objects? As it seemed nobody was keen on reading my mind or answering this question I asked it out loud.

"Where's the pain?"

"What?" the woman asked me.

"Why am I not in pain?" I asked again.

"My best guess, which looks to be true, is that you have been put under a minor spell to create you to think about anything that will take your mind off of the pain," she explained as she shuffled around and did something; I couldn't figure out what.

"Oh, so if I were to think about pain…"

She cut off my sentence again. "Your brain would send a different thought to your head and you would not feel the pain still."

"Oh, how long will it last?" I asked, not really knowing why.

"Oh, I'd say a half of an hour to fifteen minutes," she replied wearily. She must be getting sick of my constant blabbering and questions…

I awoke later that day. Or night, I soon realized it was very late. I don't remember anyone else being in this room. So why is there a snoring near me? Oh my gosh that snoring is way too loud to be in the next bed. Someone's sleeping near me!

But when I looked, nothing was there. Just the consistent hum of the snoring person's breath. I immediately began hitting the area the snoring seemed to be coming from.

"Ah! Whas goin' on?" The invisible asked. "Lily! Stop! It's me! James!"

I stopped hitting the figure and quickly apologized. He revealed himself from beneath the invisibility cloak. "What are you doing here?" I whispered slightly angry from being startled in this way.

"I've been here since after the meeting and only left to go to the detention," he told me in a whisper.

"Really? So am I making up this detention?" I asked wearily. I really didn't want to go to a detention.

"I don't know. I think because we have a week of them she'll let you miss this one. What happened exactly, because Reg keeps going on about how he was the hero and narrowly saved your life as Peeves, with your wand, was getting ready to Avada Kedavra you," James told my awestricken face.

"That's not anything like what happened!" I whisper-yelled.

"Yeah, I figured Reg's story was a load of bull," James looked thoughtful for a moment before asking what really happened.

"I walked into the classroom, told Peeves to get out, he started to throw stuff at me, Reg showed up, he didn't help because he 'didn't feel like it'. Then McGonagall showed up and it all stopped. Then Reg brought me here and now I'm telling you about this great tale."

He sat there for a moment. "Well, I'm glad you didn't get Avada Kedavra'd, but I'm going to have to kill Reg."

"I don't mind," I told him instantly. He chuckled a bit.

"How do you feel?" he asked me.

"Mm, I've been worse but this is certainly not my best," I replied. "Why is it that no matter what happens you're always here? Even when my other friends aren't." I asked him.

"Well, they stayed for a while. Alice stayed most of the time. Then Shay and Sirius were here quite a bit. Then all the others stayed in."

"How many times did you leave?" I asked him, knowing he already told me the answer.

"I got here after the meeting, and Remus dragged me out to go to the detention or I would have stayed."

"And, when did you leave for food?"

He seemed a little confused by these random questions, "I didn't. Why are we playing twenty questions?"

"How do you know about twenty questions?" I asked him in an intrigued voice.

"We did get bored as kids, and one day I heard you talking about it and asked Remus and it's just stuck with me," he explained.

I nodded in an understanding manner, though I was far from understanding. No, I wasn't confused about twenty questions; I was confused about how somebody, one person, could care so much? How did James just know everything, remember everything about me? How could I have missed his feelings before this summer? And of course, the question that got me the most, could I possibly love him back. Love him the way he loves me. I decided that I couldn't. I would never be able to love James half as much as he loves me, and I wasn't going to let James settle for a girl who doesn't love him.

"Well, thanks for staying with me." This conversation was no longer very comfortable.

"Yeah, I would any day and am sure to in the future. Especially since you and accidents seem to collide so often," he said with a smile. I smiled weakly in return.

There was a pause in which I had absolutely no clue what to say. "How'd the meeting go?" What a pathetic question…

"Huh? Oh, I guess it was okay. All the girls want a ball; the boys want a week apart from schoolwork to play Quidditch. Nothing that will ever happen."

"Well, a ball could be a nice idea," I offered.

"Yeah, I thought that we could present it to Dumbledore. It can't be Christmas 'cause my mum already invites the entire Wizarding world to our place for the annual Potter Christmas Ball. I was thinking Valentines Day. It's not the biggest occasion, but it seems a fitting time to have a ball."

"Yeah, that sounds good. We can discuss it more later and bring it up to Dumbledore," I said in my annoying professional voice.

There was a long silence. I think I fell asleep again because I woke up that morning to find Alice, Sirius, Shay, and James. To my surprise Shay and Alice were getting along well. They were talking quite a bit. James and Sirius were chatting about something in hushed tones. I then noticed how beat up I was. I looked truly awful! Oh well, another boring day in the Hospital Wing should do me loads of good! With that final thought I sighed and prepared myself for the boring day before me…

So, my opinion, crap ending. I couldn't think of a really excellent way to end the Lily/James conversation.

Again, sorry for the wait! Really, I'm sorry. Something for you to look forward to: my mum should be getting a computer within the next few weeks. Then I'll be able to write a lot more.

Sorry if I don't update for a bit. My science teacher has just given us a science fair that has to be completed in three weeks. She's mental, blame her.

I will not make you endure Lily's boring day. I will however give you more about Shay in the next chapter 'cause in case you didn't notice she's been off in the past few chapters. I think I'm going to wait on Sonya and let her get over her freaky stage on her own, but don't quote me on that.

Readers of Meals With The Marauders, I'm terribly sorry and will try to update within the next few days.

And finally, review. I don't care if you write 'good'. Just write something. Tell me if this chapter sucked, or if I should have more humor or more cheese. Give me a huge lecture about how I need to update more often, correct every mistake I made, or just rate the story on a scale of ten! Give me a word, a book, or a number. Just tell me what you think; I love knowing what the readers are thinking.

Sorry again, review, lolli


	7. Oh My God How Did I Miss That

**A/N: So this is a bit sooner than expected and I must say that you all showed me great mercy in your reviews**

**So this is a bit sooner than expected and I must say that you all showed me great mercy in your reviews. One review stuck out and made me want to get this chapter out sooner, so here it is! Of course, after I credit those nice people who reviewed: _Cherrykisses21, Sirius01, LILYandJAMESareCUTE, EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, sc12321, Happy Harry Fan, _and_ ice cream! _Thank you!**

**And just a side note: did you know that 16 of readers of the last chapter reviewed? My goal is to have 25 review. Can you readers help me here?**

* * *

So I'm free! I spent the entire yesterday talking to Alice and a still abnormally quiet Shay. Then I talked to James and Sirius and Remus, and Sonya and Yvonne came in briefly. Alice and Sonya weren't getting along, and I could see why by the way Sonya was acting. Shay had chosen Alice's side in the row, and it turns out once she got to know Alice they had a lot in common.

So life is kind of good. At least Alice has friends now who want to be around her; even if she has enemies also.

I was just walking along an empty corridor to straighten my legs when I heard someone at the other end.

"Hello?" I called. A boy emerged from around the corner. It was Adam, a seventh year Ravenclaw.

"Oh, hello Lily. Wonderful day, why are you inside?" he asked in a drawl that clearly stated he wanted to impress her.

"Oh, I just got out of the Hospital Wing," I told him.

"Oh, right! How are you? That must've been horrid. Peeves can go a bit too far at times…"

"Yeah, I'm doing well. I'm just stiff from sitting in that blasted infirmary for the past two days," I told him.

"Well that's good. So are you going to Hogsmead?" This was clearly the question he had been waiting to ask.

"Oh, yes, most likely. That is, if I don't sustain yet another injury," He chuckled.

"Maybe we could meet there?" he asked with confidence.

No, I wasn't going to go out with him! Well, maybe I should. I mean, I can't give enough to James, so I might as well… No! I really shouldn't! But he is cute… and he seems to be nice. I guess there's no harm… But James will kill him. And my friends will kill me! Oh what to do…

"Lily? If you don't want to that's fine…"

"No, I mean, yes! Yes, I'd love to meet you there!" I blurted out. I really shouldn't have said yes. I really don't want to go with him. How do I tell him now? I'm just like Sonya! Oh my good god what have I gotten myself into?

"Great! I'll meet you in the Great Hall then?" I nodded and tried my best to look excited as I dashed off to find Alice and Shay.

I walked outside, thinking that they would be by the lake. They were. I sprinted to them and they looked up at me in a questioning way.

"Lily? What's got you…"

"I just said I'd go to Hogsmead with Adam from Ravenclaw!" I blurted out before collapsing and throwing my face into my hands. I shook my head. How could I have done that!

"You What?" Shay finally seemed to show some real emotion.

"Why?" Alice asked me hastily.

"He asked me and I was unsure and then it must've been a while and he said my name and told me it was okay if I didn't want to and then I felt guilty so I said yes and then I really realized how stupid I was to say it and he was happy and now I feel like I've been buried in a trench alive and I need help!" I said this all very quickly and was gasping for breath at the end.

"Just tell him you don't really want to go," Shay suggested.

"But I'd feel so bad! I mean, be seemed so happy when I said yes," I explained.

"Then you go with him," Shay said.

"But isn't that using him like Sonya?" I wailed.

"No," Alice interjected. "Because you aren't really using him. You should go with him, and then explain to him that you really don't feel comfortable being a couple and you can be friends."

I sighed. What other choice was there? "Okay."

"It'll be okay," Alice hugged me. It wouldn't be okay though. Nothing okay could come from this awful mess I'd gotten myself into.

A few hours later I sat by the fire in the Gryffindor common room. I was alone to contemplate my stupid mistake.

"Hey Lily-flower?" Sirius asked from behind me, causing me to jump.

"Oh, hi Sirius. What do you need?" I asked him.

"I… I really want to know what's been up with Shay lately. Would you come with me to find out?"

"How do you plan to obtain this information?" I asked him, believing there to be mischief involved.

"By asking her. I'm just afraid she'll flip me again if I get too close to her," Sirius flinched recalling back when Shay flipped him over the summer.

"Er, okay. Do you know where exactly she is?" I asked for I hadn't a clue.

"Yeah, she's in the owlery." I didn't even care about how he knew this information.

"Okay then let us be off," I said as I stood up and walked to the owlery with Sirius.

As we neared the owlery a thought came to me. "Sirius?"

"Mm?" he responded.

"She's still not… friends with you," I told him.

He thought about this for a moment. "Well, maybe you should go alone…" he didn't sound like he really liked this idea.

"Well, I don't think that's the best way t handle this. Maybe I can start the conversation then introduce you and you can come in. I think we should handle it gradually. Whatever's happened to make her this way can't be very good…"

"Yeah, you're probably right. So should I wait outside the doorway?"

"Yeah. Just out of sight. And make sure you can hear," I added.

"Okay." We were at the owlery. I gave Sirius a small smile and walked into the high ceiling-ed room.

Shay was sitting, stroking her owl. There was a note in her hand, I noticed. Shay and her owl were always close. As in a close pet. Like her favorite dog, her owl was her dog.

I took a few steps closer to her. She turned to me, startled. "Oh, hello Lily," she greeted me with a smile.

"Hi," I answered, "What're you sending there?"

"Oh," she looked down at the letter uncomfortably. "It's to my mum."

"Oh. How's she doing?" I asked politely.

She continued stroking the owl and didn't speak for a moment. When she did speak, er voice was faint. "She's not doing too well. She's getting worse and requires somebody living with her. My grand mum is getting sick too. She's getting on in age and, well, my dad isn't there to take care of mum so we're thinking I'm going to have to after this year."

There was a silence. How did this girl survive when she had so much… sorrow? "I'm so sorry," I told her softly. I wrapped my arms around her. "We've been wondering about you. Sirius is even worried."

She pulled away quickly. "He does?" she asked.

I smiled to her in a comforting way. "Yeah, why haven't you told him anything? He can handle it."

"Yeah, I just… He's just changed so much and I guess I'm uncertain whether I'm absolutely sure I can trust him. I have so much going on and then there's Sonya and Yvonne separating themselves from us and…" she trailed off, beginning to sob. I pulled her closer to me and held her there.

"Shh," I tried to calm her down. After a few moments her breathing was getting back to normal.

"I'm really a… a moron. I complete… completely secluded my self from everyone and… and lost my boyfriend and…" She began sobbing again.

I didn't say anything, Sirius must just have perfect timing; or he couldn't stand hearing the sobs anymore. I saw him coming over Shay's shoulder. I was uncertain what he was going to do. He touched her shoulder lightly and I let her go. She turned to see him and he took her from me completely.

I smiled at Sirius as he held her while she cried into his shoulder. I made my way to the door, seeing as Sirius had everything under control. They looked cute standing there…

I made my way out the door and walked along the corridor to the Head common room. When I reached my destination, I attempted to finish my homework. By attempted, I really mean failed. All I could seem to think about was going to Hogsmead with Adam…

Then a thought broke through all the others: what will James do and say? I had thought about this before, but never in true detail. Will he be angry? Maybe a few years ago he'd be angry, he was always angry when I got a boyfriend. Would he be happy? Surely not! How could he be? Would he be ashamed of me? I couldn't tell him. How would I be able to? But what if he asked me to go with him? Would I've said yes?

I worked on my homework until it was dusk. The thoughts from earlier never left my head…

"Lily? Are you in there?" I must have been very deep in thought because James was back and was looking at me like I was crazy.

"Oh, sorry," I said hurriedly.

"It's okay. Feeling stiff still?" he asked me.

"Yeah, a bit. I guess that's expected though," I responded.

"Well, wanna come for a broom ride with me?"

I remembered the last broom ride I had with James Potter. I remember how amazing it was and how it took my breath right out of me, "I think that sounds like something I'd like to do."

He smiled and I smiled back. "Well then let us be off. The sun is starting to set and that's a glorious sight from up in the sky."

We went down to the school grounds. We both mounted James' broom. "Ready?" he asked me.

"Yup."

He kicked off hard and we were soaring through the air. Even those times I had remembered the broom ride with James in the past, nothing compared to the feeling that I got when I was actually riding on the broom.

All that entered my mind was the sun setting, the wind whistling, and James. James must've been the item that had cross my mind the most often over that day.

"Lily?"

"Yes?" I responded.

"I know that I've only asked you out a million and a half times in the past, and I'm sure this could've been asked sooner, but seeing as Hogsmead is this weekend, will you accompany me?" he asked. He was so romantic. I mean, getting me to come up here with him watching the sunset, and now he's asking me to Hogsmead.

"Of course I'll go with you," I told him, slightly in a daze. I must have been tired, though I didn't have a clue how…

When we landed I stumbled my way to the library where Alice was studying. She looked over the tower of books to me. "Hi Lily. Why do you look so happy?" she asked grinning.

Words couldn't express it. What was I going to say? "James asked me to Hogsmead!" I nearly screamed in her face.

The smile drained from her face immediately. "Lily, that's really bad."

"Why?" I couldn't comprehend this. I mean, today James asked me out while on a romantic broom ride, Shay, Sirius, and I are all getting along, and… Oh My God!

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**So, a little cliff-like, but I plan on updating again later today. Snow day made me write this and really, it just flowed. So if you have a complaint, please tell me. I didn't like this chapter much, but at least now I have a bit of a plot to work with. I hope you enjoyed that, lollipop**


	8. In Too Deep

**So, not that we need a refresher, but whatever here it goes anyway!**

_Words couldn't express it. What was I going to say? "James asked me to Hogsmead!" I nearly screamed in her face._

_The smile drained from her face immediately. "Lily, that's really bad."_

"_Why?" I couldn't comprehend this. I mean, today James asked me out while on a romantic broom ride, Shay, Sirius, and I are all getting along, and… Oh My God!_

"Oh my God how did this happen?" I wailed helplessly.

"Lily, how do you say yes to two people in the same day and not remember how you did it?" Alice asked me.

"I don't know. James was just, we were flying and, and it was sun set and gorgeous and he asked me up in the air and I said yes and… Oh I'm a moron!" I screeched.

"Shh! I really can't be kicked out of the library Lily," Alice whispered.

There was an abnormally long silence before a huge bang.

"Lily!" Alice scolded as I lifted my head from where I had just it against the table. "I don't know what we're going to do yet, but we'll think of something. You look tired. Go get some sleep, I'll talk to Shay and see if she has any ideas."

"Thanks Alice…" I mumbled as I made my way to my head bedroom.

How did I manage to get myself into this mess? How did such a mess even exist? Should I go with what's right, or what I want?

I want to go with James.

But Adam asked me first, so I should realistically go with him.

But how am I supposed to say 'no, I can't in fact go with you to Hogsmead because I already said I'd go with Adam. You know, that kid you always picked on?' Well, James picked on a lot of kids so that would be kind of vague…

And how would I tell Adam? 'I'm sorry Adam, but I really only said I'd go out with you because I had nothing better to do and I thought I'd feel bad, but now that James asked me out, I think I'll go with him instead.'

I'm doomed! People in movies have gone with two people on one date. But they always failed pathetically… Yes, I am most definitely doomed.

I reached my bed and fell onto it. I was terribly tired, yet I rolled for hours trying to get to sleep. Nothing was comfortable because the feeling of guilt was suffocating me.

At around two in the morning I got up and went to sit out in the common room. I sat in front the window with of what must've been the best view of all windows in Hogwarts. I looked over the lake and over to the Quidditch pitch. I could just see the Whomping Willow, shaking in the soft night breeze.

I don't know when exactly I fell asleep, but James woke me up the next morning.

"Lily? Wake up Lils," he shook me softly. I moaned some incoherent sentence and wound up hitting James in the gut before I finally fully awoke.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" I said frantically. I jumped up from my seat by the window.

"It's okay," he told me. "But you should go get dressed so that you can make breakfast before defense against the dark arts." I looked at the clock and ran hysterically to my room to get dressed.

In ten minutes I was walking out the door to my room. "Well, good morning," James told me with a smile.

"Morning," I said in what I thought was a good cheerful expression. I wasn't al that cheerful on the inside considering my immense stupidity from yesterday.

We walked down to the Great Hall talking and sat down at the Gryffindor table. We ate quickly and headed to our first Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson.

When we entered the classroom, which smelled strongly of rotting socks (Peeves must have finished with the classroom after the Prefect meeting), James and I took a seat towards the back with Remus, Sirius, Shay, Peter, Alice, and Sonya and Yvonne two tables in front of them. Alice had saved me a seat next to her, and, thankfully because it felt so much more awkward to be near James knowing that I'm deceiving him, Sirius saved James' seat far from mine.

"Good morning students!" Professor Hanlinfyfe called as he entered the classroom and promptly tripped over his robes.

He helped himself up, attempting to ignore the sniggers that were coming from the students, and continued his speech. "Welcome to Defense Against the Dark Arts!" he gave the typical first lesson speech, and told us to work in pairs disarming each other without speaking. This was something we had done the year before, and everybody seemed to think this feat was easy.

Everyone was choosing his or her partners when a tap on the shoulder came from behind. I spun around to see Adam standing there.

"Oh, hello Adam," I tried to sound polite.

"Hey, Lily, want to be partners?" he asked grinning.

"Er… Well, you see… er…" I stammered.

"What she means is, she'd really love to, but she promised to help Shay because Shay's been having difficulties doing non-verbal spells," Sonya explained.

"Oh, okay. Maybe next time then, see you later, Lily!" he called as he left to find another partner.

"Thank you Alice!" I told her quietly.

"Anytime," she then noticed Shay and Sirius talking. "No, Shay Lily needs you to work with her."

"Why? I was going to…"

"Remember what I told you last night? About the flaw? Well this is one moment we need to sacrifice our own personal stuff to help Lily," explained in a hushed tone so Sirius couldn't hear.

"Fine," she said reluctantly. "Could you work with James so that I can work with Lily?" she asked him sweetly.

"I guess so," he said in an overly dramatic manner.

"Thanks," she said in the flirty voice that I hadn't heard from her in a while.

The class went on unproductively for the most part, and the day went the same. Nothing too interesting happened until after dinner in the heads common room.

I was doing my homework when James walked in. I looked up and smiled nicely. "Hey," I greeted him.

He collapsed onto the sofa next to me, "Hey." There was a small silence. "Can I ask you a question?"

I looked at him for a moment before answering, "Sure, what do you want to know?"

"Well, what was up with Adam Brougher today when he came over to talk to you in Defense Against the Dark Arts?"

My pulse quickened. Of all questions he had to ask this one. "Er… I don't, er, know. He just… he just came over."

He looked at me suspiciously. He looked like he was going to say something else, but shut his mouth and accepted my answer.

"Okay," he responded. He trusted me when I lied to him. He had enough trust in me to believe me, even when he so obviously wasn't certain about my statement.

"Could you help me with this Transfiguration?" I asked him after a few moments of silence.

"Sure, what're you on?" he asked. He moved closer and helped me out. Oddly enough James' close proximity was making me nervous. I shook that feeling and tried to concentrate on what he was telling me. After we finished my Transfiguration assignment I went off to bed.

I slept that night, it was the worst night's sleep I had in a while, but I slept.

_The day had brought the most controversy Lily's mind had had in a while. She knew she_ should _have told James_ _she couldn't go with him, but she had gone one mistake too far. She'd fallen for James too quickly. She'd gotten herself into a situation far to deep to get out of safely…_

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**So, what do you think of my nice little bit at the end? This was a short chapter, but it's the second one today so it should even out for you.**

**Credit to you people who review so darn fast:** _LILYandJAMESareCUTE, EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, twinfeathers, _**and **_piegirl10164. _**Thanks guys and lets try for 25 percent of readers reviewing!**

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	9. So Close

**So I wrote this chapter and was almost done and the program decided to shut down itself and not save so I hope this is as good as I thought the first one was because to tell you the truth I have no clue how exactly I wrote the last one. I guess it just flowed and now I've got to come up with something else. Well, hope you like it. I thought of a few lines whilst in Religion class today that should brighten the mood a bit! Credits at the end this time… enjoy!**

I woke up tired the next morning and took as long as humanly possible to get ready. I skipped breakfast and left straight for Transfiguration.

I was early. My lack of sleep made me get up extremely early and now I am sitting in the classroom with three other kids. Sonya and Yvonne, who still were acting strange and now refused to talk to me because I took "Alice's side". I mean, how five year old is that?

The other person was Sev. I still had no real intention to talk to him. I really wish he hadn't gone dark and evil on me. I mean, I could always tell him everything, and I hate to see his hurt face now because anytime that James is around me he seems so sad. I mean, I guess it's like James took his place and maybe he regrets that we moved apart from one another, but it still hurts to see him that way.

A few moments passed and every so often I felt Sev's gaze lingering on me. It made me shiver from the feeling of being watched. Soon thought my thoughts were brought back to planet Earth when Shay and Alice walked in.

They took seats on either side of me, something I was grateful of. Now I would not have to sit near James. It's not that I didn't like James, cause I really do like him, but being around him is slightly uncomfortable when you know that any moment you could blurt out the big secret. And even I know if the circumstances get too uncomfortable I'll blurt something out. I always do…

"We missed you at breakfast," Alice told me.

"Yeah, I wasn't hungry," I replied.

"You really should eat you know," Alice told me in the motherly voice.

"Yeah, but I'm not hungry, so I don't need to eat," I told her.

"Well that's the worst reasoning I've hear in a while. And yet, it makes sense…" Shay said.

There was a short silence before I broke it with the question that had kept me up all night… "What am I going to do?" I cried to them.

"About what?" Shay asked, gaining a glare from me and Alice alike.

"About James and Adam you idiot!" Alice told her.

"Oh, well sorry!" Shay threw up her hands in defense before crossing her arms and pretending to glare at the wall.

"So what do I do?" I asked Alice, seeing as Shay seemed to be no help to me at the moment.

"I think, although I do believe you would be better off with James, that you need to tell James the truth and that you can't go with him because you already said yes to Adam. Make sure to explain everything though," she added quickly.

I pondered this. I guess it was right, even if I wanted to go with James. "Yeah, you're probably right. When do I tell him, after class?"

"No, wait til you have time to explain. After dinner tonight do it," Alice reasoned.

"Okay," I mumbled. I just need to hold it all together until then…

A few moments later, after some more talking, the four boys walked into the nearly full classroom.

"That's absurd, Moony!" Sirius bellowed as the boys walked in.

"A lot of people _do_ go to libraries, Sirius," James told him in a reasoning voice.

"I think not!" Sirius yelled at James and Remus. "That's as absurd as saying that in the future muggle gangs will walk around saying stuff like, _'Yo dog! Waz up in da hizouse? Word!'_"

The class was silent for a long moment. Remus and James were staring disbelievingly at their very strange friend.

"What the bloody hell…" James began before Remus cut him off saying, "That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my life!"

The rest of the class broke into fits of laughter. "But you see, Remus, this proves that nobody goes to libraries."

"How does that prove that nobody goes to libraries?" Remus asked incredulously.

Sirius looked deep in thought for a moment before responding, "I think that's a pretty obvious question my dear, dear, Remmy." Remus shook his head and the four boys took their seats in the classroom.

Luckily for me, the only seats left were quite far from the seat I had chosen, and I didn't even have to sit near James. The class droned on slowly and when it was finally dismissed we moved along to the next class. The entire day moved in this fashion, and I seemed to be moving in a slow-motion trance. I was getting more and more anxious as the day continued, but not any more than I was at dinner.

Dinner was a time of fun and socializing. A time where we sit with the Marauders and joke around and unwind after a long day at Hogwarts. For me, this was not very relaxing. I was sitting next to James Potter, and was definitely acting suspiciously. I was fidgety and when James began to talk to me I babbled like a moron with half of a brain. I always think of the name _Drew_ when I think of morons, though I have absolutely no clue as to why…

I was beginning to relax as the conversation got more interesting. The topic of conversation was strange stories and folklore's we've heard. Sirius told one of a manatee named Barbara who sang her lungs out to a human to take her to the ball before rejecting the human because he told her he couldn't dance.

Then James told one of an old wizard who accidentally turned himself into a soda can and wound up playing the tambourine with the little tab at the top. The stories got stranger and stranger as the meal went on. We had been there for quite some time, and everything was going fine. But of course something was destined to go wrong.

Just in the middle of Sirius' next epic tale, I had a soft tap on the shoulder. I turned smiling to see Adam looking at me with a look of irritation.

"Oh, hi, Adam," I said quietly, hoping nobody would notice, but I heard the conversation die down, and felt the gaze of all my friends on me now.

He sighed deeply, remorsefully. "I'm sorry, Lily. My grandfather just dies recently and I didn't really know him that well, but my family insists that I go up for his funeral and everything and Dumbledore told my mother I could go so I won't be able to make it this weekend. Maybe next Hogsmead weekend we can go out?" he questioned.

The color had drained from my face. No, no, no! He didn't just say that! He couldn't have! Why did this have to happen just an hour before I was going to tell James? Everything could've been all right, but no, everything has been ruined!

The thoughts fled through my mind as I looked up at Adam. I nodded my head in response to his question, and he smiled weakly as he said a quick goodbye and walked away.

The silence behind me was unbearable. All of my friends' eyes were on me. It felt as though the Great Hall had swelled up to twice its normal size and swallowed me whole. It felt as though every eye in the Great Hall were upon me, watching intently as I make a fool of myself for what must've been the millionth time in my years at Hogwarts.

And now I had the choice of what to do. I could turn around and explain here, or I could run. A true Gryffindor would choose the first without a second thought, but right now, the chances of me running were high.

_A coward, that's what I am, a coward_. I thought bitterly to myself. No, I wasn't going to be a coward, not this time. I would turn around, back to reality, back to my friends, and everything will work out.

I turned my body slowly and saw the eyes bearing down on me. Shay, Alice and Remus looked sympathetic. Alice must've told Remus, he must've realized something was wrong with the way I was acting… Sirius looked a little shocked and confused, but almost looked sympathetic for me as he placed the pieces of the puzzle of my life together.

The one pair of eyes that really mattered were met with mine. The were in shock and a pained hurt when I looked into them. The normal hazel was soft and in pain. As the words Adam had said sunk in, his eyes' injury seemed to deepen. I somehow knew from the beginning that I would end up running. But instead of running to not see the expression on his face, I was running from the expression on his face. As if it would consume me whole.

I dashed out of the Great Hall and ran until I could no longer breathe. I collapsed against a wall and tried to think of something. Something to get my mind away from him, but when my eyes were closed all I saw was the imprint of his face in my mind. I didn't dare open my eyes in case the tears that were stinging them at the moment relinquished from my eyes.

So I kept my eyes closed until the tears broke through the barrier. Through the tears and flow of water I still saw his face, the hurt expression never fading for a minute.

I stayed in the chilly corridor for a while. The tears had dried onto my face, and my eyes were empty of tears. Once in a while a sob would flutter out of me to travel tearlessly down the corridor before fading into the stagnant evening air.

I stood shakily after some time, and made my way slowly and quietly back the Head dormitory. Maybe James would be up waiting for me. Waiting for me to explain what I had done and to forgive me and tell me he loves me either way. But this fantasy never came true. When I entered the head common room is was dark and empty. I was woefully reminded of how I felt, and now feel again, after seeing the saddened look on James' face.

I walked into my room and collapsed in my uniform onto the bed. I softly cried and let the new tears fall before drifting off into a horrid sleep. It was dreamless, yet I thrashed around and woke myself up numerous times. When morning came I debated whether to go to classes today or not.

I chose to skip my first class to get myself ready for the day ahead of me. I got up and looked in the mirror. The heavy bags under my eyes demanded more sleep, and my hair was screaming to be washed. But under it all, all the horrid nights sleep and horrid new memories, was the Lily who was bold and confident. Now I just had to dig under all of the new, devastating emotions to get to the girl underneath them. And I would do it. I had to; otherwise I would never be able to make it through this one tough patch…

So, I guess that was good, right? I think I wrote this well so… What'd you think? It was a little different as in the style of writing. Not as much dialogue as usual. Well, it's up to you. Tell me if you want the old chapters back or if the new chapters are good.

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**Credit for reviews goes to: by the way. Did you know out of 53 hits on the last chapter, only 6 reviews made it? That's about 11 percent. I'm not saying that the reviews aren't great, but considering two are from friends, that leaves four, and at this stage of the game, you've got to be reading the story because you like it, otherwise you'd give up, would you not? So, yes, this is what I think about, how people who read the story don't review. Also, 22 people have alerts on this, and 5 of those people are reviewing. I just seem to think this is strange. Anyway, now my rant is over and dear God I praise you if you read all of that redundant junk! Right, back to the credits: **_EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, ice cream, LILYandJAMESareCUTE, Sirius01, Cherrykisses21, Cookies94, __**and**__ Heart Of The Phoenix! __**Thank you!**_

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	10. To the Dark Side

Oh, my god

**Oh, my god! I am so euphoric right now! You know why? Because I got 18 reviews for the last chapter alone. 18 freaking reviews! Wahoo! See, I knew I wasn't getting all the reviews! Oh I'm so happy and can't wait to list all the names! So here are those lovely people: **_LILYandJAMESareCUTE, EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, ice cream, Cherrykisses21, Heart of the Phoenix, khs, Happy Harry Fan, L.D.Anastasia, Siriusly love Padfoot, sc12321, Siriusly-confused22, Holy Cross Baby, Baying-for-the-Moon, He'sAPirate, MEG-N-GBM, Cookies94, piegirl10164, and YisTheRumAlwaysGone. _**Thank you so much guys! And I'm sorry this is late. I've been at my mum's house for the past two weeks and she can't seem to bring herself to call a service and get Internet for her new laptop. She's a procrastinating lazy person…**

After deciding not to go to my first class of the day, I laid back down and actually slept. I slept without waking once. I knew that I had had dreams, but I wouldn't remember them when I was awoken later that day…

"Lily," someone was saying as they shook my shoulder. I moaned for them to stop and tried to swat them away with my hand. I made brief contact with a cloak before rolling over to get away from the person trying to wake me.

"Lils, you've been asleep all day," they told me. This made me curious. How long was "all day"?

"Wha time zit?" I mumbled groggily.

"Four thirty. Alice took you're work down for you though," the person told me.

I was awake. Very suddenly, and not quite completely, but awake. "What? I slept all day? You're kidding me!" I screamed at the person lying on their stomach with their legs in the air behind them.

"Nope! You slept all day," Shay told me whilst smiling.

"Why didn't you wake me?" I cried.

"Because you looked tired enough yesterday and figured you didn't sleep much, so Alice decided I should let you sleep," Shay explained, still smiling.

I stared in shock at the wall for a few moments. I then took in how refreshed I felt.

"Are you hungry? You've got to be hungry!" Shay said suddenly.

I thought for a moment before realizing just how hungry I was. "Yeah, let's go," I said as I got up from the bed and made my way to the dresser.

"Woah! You can't go to dinner looking like that!" Shay cried. I frowned at her and looked into the mirror. 'Woah' was right; I was a mess!

"You go take a shower and I'll plan your clothes for you. Chop, chop!" Shay said as she dragged me to the bathroom by my hand and shoved me in. I obeyed and in ten minutes I was walking out in a towel drying off my hair.

"So what do I have to wear?" I asked her. She gestured me to the bed where what must have been at least ten different robes were laid out on top of one another.

"I'm not wearing all of those!" I cried, looking to her incredulously.

"But the layered look is totally in!" She told me enthusiastically.

"No way am I going to wear a weeks worth of clothes to go to dinner," I told her finally.

"Okay… Be a party pooper why don't you," she muttered at me with a pouty face.

I laughed at her attempt to get me to cave in. "You know that doesn't work," I told her. "And I am going to wear the clothes you picked out; just not all of them."

She pondered this for a moment. "I guess that's okay… As long as you wear these robes together," she told me.

"Okay, I will," I told her. They did look like they would look nice together.

When I was dressed and my hair was dried and brushed we went down to the Great Hall for dinner.

"So where is Alice?" I asked Shay after a small chat about first years and why the boys are so obnoxious.

"Oh, she needed to go to the library to see Remus and tell him that Sirius was going mad and attempting to eat James," She told me as though it were nothing and stuff like it happened every day. Well, with the Marauders I guess stuff like this did happen every day…

"Really? Is that all?" I asked sarcastically.

"Well, apparently, as James gasped out while running away from psycho Sirius, this happens often and it's no big deal," Shay told me. I got a sinking feeling in my stomach when she mentioned his name. It was then that I fully remembered why I had skipped class to sleep all day today; why I had been tired enough to sleep all day.

"Lils? You in there?" Shay asked me.

"What? Oh, yeah… I just got a sickly feeling. It's nothing," I told her reassuringly.

"You're probably just hungry. Come on!" she said before grasping me by the hand and skipping down the corridor, dragging ma along in her wake. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling very hungry right now. In fact, I had the feeling that if I did eat the food would end up coming back up. Disgusting…

We got to the Great Hall and Alice was waiting for us with Remus. "Hey sleepy-head!" she said to me as I sat down beside her. Shay sat next to Remus and across from me.

"Hi," I said to both her and Remus. "So what exactly happened with Sirius?" I asked curiously.

"Oh, about once a month he gets really weird. I think he drinks coffee… Anyway. He get strange urges and occasionally tries to eat somebody," Remus told me.

"Well, we always knew he was gonna be a nutter…" Alice mentioned.

"Yeah," I agreed.

"Hey! No picking on my boy friend!" Shay butted in. We all laughed.

"Heaven knows why you'd date him," Alice muttered.

"Because he's amazing," Shay said in a tone that told us that was all she needed.

"Amazing at what, exactly?" Remus asked, smirking into his food.

"Ew! No, no, no!" Shay covered her ears immaturely and freaked out. She stood up from the table and jumped in circles, attracting many strange glances and stares from the surrounding tables. When she finished her dance she gave a very voluntary shudder and sat down as though nothing had happened.

"None of that raunchiness, Remus," Alice scolded.

"Sorry," Remus said, finally looking up from his plate. "It's hard having to be the mature one _all_ the time you know." He smiled and we all laughed.

"Geez, you're on a roll tonight, Remus!" Alice said amid the laughter.

He laughed, "It's a good time. Not having to be the worrier," he told us.

"Eh hem?" A small voice questioned from behind Remus. We all looked to see who it was; Sonya.

"Hello," Alice said coldly. "What do you need? Are you here to rub it in somebody's face, _again_ I might add, that you're going to Hogsmead with Xeno?"

Sonya flushed a light shade of pink. "No, I'm here to tell you that… that…"

"Well?" Alice said, frustrated.

"That you were right about my reasoning of going to Hogsmead with Xeno and I told him everything. He was upset, but he was really forgiving. I'm not going to Hogsmead with him. I really miss you, Lily, and you too Shay. And…" she swallowed. "And I think that I can attempt to become closer to you, Alice, if you'll do that same for me."

Alice looked up at her and I smiled. Alice nodded, "I think that we can figure something out. You seem ready to be forgiven either way," Alice told her and both girls shared a small smile.

"Where's Yvonne?" Shay asked her, interrupting the nice moment.

Sonya seemed uncomfortable now. "Well," She started. She sat down next to Remus and began her story. "Yvonne is… she's changed. At first I thought it was the rebellion of actually having a fight. She always seemed to enjoy fighting with people. Then she started telling me things. She said she could trust me. She was talking big; I thought she was fibbing at first. She told me of her plans with _them_.

"After a few days she wasn't hanging around me very much. Only in classes would she sit with me. I don't think that she wanted you guys to suspect anything. But she was growing farther from me. She was hanging around with this group of Slytherins. Their a lesser known group, but they're all heading for the same thing; _him._

"A few days ago I decided to talk to her; see if I could bring her back. But… she wouldn't listen. When I told her my plans to apologize she looked like she was going to spit at me. She was screaming about me being cowardly and how going back to you showed just how vulnerable I was," Sonya was on the verge of tears now.

"She stomped out of the room and hasn't talked to me since. She glares at me a lot. I don't actually know if she's joined him yet. I can't imagine she has, but it can't be long now…" she was crying now, we all had some kind of tear in our eyes by this point.

Why would Yvonne do this? How long has she been planning this? Could we have done something to prevent it? Or has it always been to late?

There was now an awkward silence lingering over us. "Hiya people!" Someone shouted.

"Why so quiet?" Another voice asked.

"Sonya! You're back!" Sirius embraced Sonya and the five of us looked up to the two boys.

"Yeah, Sirius," she said patting his shoulder. "You can… sit down now… or let go… any time now…" She told him. "Sirius, get away from me!" She bellowed.

Sirius jumped back in surprise. "Geez, angry chick!" Sirius exclaimed, taking the seat next to Shay and piling food onto the plate in front of him.

"Why are you so irritable?" James asked the table. It seemed as though he were cleverly avoiding my gaze. I think if he looked over I would avoid his gaze too…

Remus looked to Sonya, Shay, Alice, and I for help. Nobody seemed willing to be the bearer of bad news. Sonya finally sighed and retold the tragic tale.

"She didn't!" Sirius exclaimed by the end of Sonya's story. "She gives us Gryffindors a bad name for ourselves! The traitor! I can't believe a friend of mine, of ours, would do something like this! It's so low… evil…" Sirius trailed off in a mad evil villain style of talking.

"Yeah, I was shocked," Shay said. "We all were," she added.

"What would influence her to go to _his _side_?_" James asked with distaste.

"Maybe we did something wrong," Sonya said. "Maybe we should have included her more. She was always the one who would be left out if someone needed to be left out…"

"But that almost never happened," I stated. "This can't possibly be our fault." _Can it? _I wondered silently.

"Lily's right. You guys can't blame yourselves. I'm positive you had nothing to do with anything that she's be planning or is doing," Remus assured us.

"How can you be positive? Did you go up and have a nice chat with God? Did he tell you, 'Remus, those girls, they had nothing to do with this'?" Shay questioned irritably.

"He's just trying to make you feel better!" Alice interjected.

"Well isn't that easy for you to say now! You know you had nothing to do with it because you never got the chance to know her!" Shay yelled in Alice's face.

"You guys! Can't we be together for a few moments, all of us, without fighting?" I asked them, utterly fed up with the arguing. "Shay, stop with this. You and I both know that we had nothing to do with this and that…" But Shay cut me off.

"Oh, why yes! Oh great Lily! Bearer of the great news! Prophet!" Shay stopped a passing second year that looked utterly frightened. "Did you know she's a prophet and that she talks to God and can predict the future?" She asked. The little boy shook his head from right to left. Shay released him and he ran to his friends.

"Well, now that we know your secret, Lily, who wants pie?" She slid the pie forcibly at me.

I was sick of her attitude now. "Can you stop bitching for two seconds?" I bellowed. I stood from the table a walked away from her. Tears were stinging my eyes. _I will not cry. Not here. I can wait._ I told myself. And I did wait. I got to my bedroom before I broke down and cried. _What was happening? Why did it seem my friends could never truly be friends anymore. Surely our friendship can last. Right?_ These were just a few thoughts that crossed my mind as I sat on my bed.

A knock came from the door before it opened silently. _Crap! I should've locked that! _I thought bitterly. James walked in awkwardly. We avoided each other's gazes for a moment before they finally met.

"Are you okay, Lils?" he asked. It seemed like a stupid question considering I was so obviously not okay.

"I'm fine," I said sourly. He looked at me skeptically. "Well, no, I'm not okay," I admitted. He sighed and moved to the armchair near my bed.

"I guess we have to talk about some things. Before we get into anything deep, Shay's in a bad mood, but didn't fight with anyone else. Sonya thinks that she'll be fine after some sleep," James started. There was a small pause. "And now the tougher to discuss stuff. What's going on? I think you understand my vagueness?" He questioned.

I nodded. "The… The truth is that I told Adam that I would go to Hogsmead before I said yes to you."

"Why did you say yes to me asking you if you were already going with somebody?" he interrupted.

"I… I should tell you the whole story. It might make more sense," I told him. He nodded and I began the tale that had messed up my life so much in the past few days. "I had just gotten out of the Hospital Wing that morning when I ran into Adam. We exchanged hellos and he asked me to Hogsmead. I really didn't want to go with him, but I said yes anyway. It was a mistake; I just couldn't seem to say no.

"So I was stressed about this for much of that day and then you asked me for a broom ride. I couldn't resist. I needed it either way. So we were up in the air, it was nearing sundown; it was gorgeous. You planned everything perfectly! I got lost in the moment. Then you asked me to Hogsmead and I said yes. I was in a trance. It wasn't until I went to tell Alice that I was going to Hogsmead with you that I actually realized, well, she actually realized my mistake.

"I was horrified. I couldn't believe that I actually managed to do something so… so moronic. I was freaking out.

"I asked Alice and Shay for help. Of course I turned to my friends for help and advice. They told me that I needed to go with Adam because it was the right thing to do because he asked me first. It was true and I was going to tell you that morning, but Alice told me to wait because I would want time to explain everything. She was both right and wrong in a sense.

"Yes, I guess I do need time to explain the story. So I decided to wait until after dinner when we were up here. But, Adam came to the table before I got to explain anything," I finished, avoiding his lingering gaze upon me.

"So, probably a dumb question, but why'd you run?" he asked me curiously. It wasn't a dumb question. Why did I run? Was it because I was too cowardly to handle the situation there?

"I guess…" I thought about the question for a moment before finding the right answer. "I guess it was when I looked at you. You were confused, but I could see that you seemed hurt. I couldn't blame you in the least, but I… I couldn't handle seeing you that way knowing that it was I who caused it."

James looked at me intently, trying to attract my gaze to his. He won and I finally looked at him. He smiled lightly. "Thank you for explaining your tale to me. Now I guess I should explain why I've been avoiding you?"

I was taken aback. "Wasn't it because you didn't want to be around me? Because I had hurt you so you didn't want to be near me?" I asked him.

"Well, though that may have been a portion of it, I've come to realize, over the past day, that there was more to it. Actually Remus and Sirius pointed it out. Peter couldn't have thought of it," he began. I smiled at the last piece of information and he continued.

"So I was moping around the boy's dormitory. Pacing, sitting, anything that would get my mind off of you. None of those things worked because it turns out you were all I thought about. Thinking back on it now I realized that all of my thoughts were focused on you telling me something rude and going off with Adam.

"I was a wreck. Then Remus and Sirius came in and asked me why I wasn't finding out what was happening. I responded by the same thing that you thought; I didn't want to talk to you. Well, Remus did one of those stares where he can tell everything you want to know about how you're feeling at that moment. They're really creepy actually. But anyway, Remus stared at me and said something like 'are you sure that's the reason' and I actually wasn't so certain, but I said yes anyway.

"Remus went on about some stuff. How I was feeling. He used a lot of large words, Sirius looked flabbergasted. And he said, to sum it up at the end, 'are you sure you aren't afraid that she won't want you'. And I knew that Remus was right.

"But I still didn't want to go near you; just in case. But Sirius told me that if I never went near you, wouldn't it be worse than actually knowing for a fact that you hate me? I realized, after a bit, that he was right and I finally came to see you," He finished before adding, "Thankfully, you don't seem to hate me yet." I smiled at him.

"Thanks. And I'm really sorry about the abruptness of this, but could you leave so that I could get some sleep. I've gotten very tired very fast. Heavens knows how that happened considering I spent the day sleeping," I muttered.

"Well, you've had a lot on your mind, no thanks to me. Get some sleep and I'll see you in the morning?" he questioned.

I nodded, "Yeah, see you in the morning." He made his way to the door. Just before he shut out the light he asked a final question.

"Do you still want to go to Hogsmead with me?" This question thankfully didn't take much thought.

"Yes, James. I would love to," I told him. The last thing I saw before he turned out the light and left was his crooked grin. I smiled. Everything was going to get better. Well, most of everything…

**So, long wait long chapter. Does that work for you? I won't make the wait that long again. Well, I probably will at some point, but it won't be a regular thing. Please review! I loved all the reviews last time and would like to get just as many this time! lolli **


	11. A Hardship

Chapter 11: A Hardship Chapter 11: A Hardship

I awoke the next morning smiling. I was smiling the entire time I got dressed. I felt as though I were floating on a cloud. A cloud made of messy black hair. I put on my robes and walked out to Head's common room smiling like an idiot.

I was surprised in a sense, yet not at all surprised that James was already waiting for me. "Ready?" he asked me.

"Yup," I said, fully aware I was still smiling like an idiot.

He laughed, probably at the look on my face, and walked toward the door with me by his side. I hadn't noticed before, but his cologne was quite strong. I normally wasn't a person for cologne, but somehow James' cologne was intoxicating…

He must've noticed something because his imploring voice broke through my thoughts. "What are you thinking about?" It was a simple question.

"Your cologne," I answered simply.

He seemed startled by this. "What about it?" he took his robe and lifted it to his nose. "I think it smells fine; is there a problem with it?" he asked me.

"No, I only just noticed it though. It's quite intoxicating," I told him. He laughed.

"I'm glad to know that I intoxicate you." We shared a laugh and soon we were at the great hall.

It was hard for me to believe that it was already nearing October. This year seemed to be flying by; and this was the one year I wish would last forever…

We quickly spotted Shay, Alice, Sonya, Sirius, Peter, and Remus sitting at the far end of the Gryffindor house table. We made our way to sit by them and Alice looked at me curiously.

"So… Are you two good now?" She asked me quietly.

I nodded my head smiling. "We talked last night," I told her, regaining that goofy grin from earlier.

She laughed at the look on my face. "So are you going to Hogsmead together then?" She asked with her eyebrows raised in a stealthy manner.

"Yes," I told her. "And what's that look for?" I asked her.

"Well, Ms. Evans! It looks as if your boyfriend is the one boy you swore to hate for, how many years now? Six… Seven?" Alice teased. To my surprise, I could feel my ears growing hot with embarrassment at the term boyfriend. "What's up, Lils?" Alice asked me after seeing my ears, which must be glowing a florescent red.

"Well, I didn't think… Well, not yet at least… James Potter my…" I stuttered to get the sentence out. "There's a difference between going out somewhere with someone, and _going out_ with someone," I said quietly.

Alice laughed and I glared at her. "Lily, it's okay if you don't think of James as a boyfriend yet. I'm sorry I startled you with the term," Alice said smiling comfortingly at me.

"Yeah, I guess I may have over reacted," I admitted. Yet, the statement of 'boyfriend' raced through my mind. _Does James think of _me_ as a girlfriend? Should I think of him as a boyfriend? Does he expect me to think of him as a girlfriend?_

Alice must have spotted this in me and told me comfortingly, "Don't worry, Lily. James would never push you into something that you don't think you're ready for." Alice's comforting words soothed me, but the questions still lingered in the back of my mind. Little did I know that within minutes my previous thoughts would be eliminated from my mind…

"So Shay, did you get a good night's sleep?" James asked Shay while he ate a piece of toast.

Sirius choked on a sausage link he was shoving into his mouth along with the rest of the food on the Gryffindor table. It was almost as if he were holding back laughter…

James' eyebrows rose to Sirius. "Is there something funny I'm missing?" James asked with a smirk.

Sirius swallowed his food forcefully, a task in itself. "No, James. There's nothing funny. I was choking on my food," Sirius told him forcefully, as if he were trying to get James to shut up.

"Is Sirius trying to hide something? Something from last night perhaps?" James teased his friend as Sirius glared at James over the maple syrup.

Alice began to catch on. "You know what, James? I don't think I saw Shay last night." Alice said with mock suspicion. Shay grew red in the face and seemed to shrink into the bench.

"Well, did you two have fun?" James asked. "You seem in a much better mood today, Shay. It isn't a wonder why, really," James said, still smirking at Sirius' glare.

Just then, a lone owl entered the great hall. I thought it early for the owls to be arriving, but maybe this owl was simply faster than the others. Everyone glanced up at the owl and seemed to guess the same as me because barely any of them bothered to follow the owl to the select student.

I was in shock when the owl landed in front of me. I took the letter from its leg and let it nibble on a sausage link while I opened the letter. It was from my father.

_Dear Lily, _

_Sorry to be writing so urgently, but your mother has become very ill and is headed to the hospital as I write this to you. Your mother is asking for you. Please get here as soon as you can. I will explain fully when you get here. _

_Love,_

_Dad_

I sat in shock as my face grew pale. There was a change in the mood of my friends. All their eyes were all upon me. I stood up urgently and walked to Dumbledore briskly. I handed him the letter quickly, not being able to say anything. His face grew wary as he read the short passage. He nodded for me to follow him as he rose from his seat and began to walk towards the doors of the great hall. I stopped momentarily to duplicate the letter and handed it to Alice who scanned over it as I left the room behind Dumbledore.

The hundreds of gazes seemed to fade away when the doors shut closed behind me. "Your father seems very worried, so I'm going to ask you only a few questions before I let you leave," Dumbledore told me quickly. "Firstly, do you know what hospital your family would be at right now?" he asked me.

I thought for a moment. "Yes, it's a small hospital just outside of our community," I began. I told him the information on the hospital and he nodded.

"We'll need to get you down to Hogsmead so that you can apparate near the hospital," he told me. "Now, Lily, this is sure to be a stressful time for you. Would you like to take one other student with you? A friend? I normally wouldn't allow this, but because of your father being in the state he is sure to be in, and your sister not being the most loving of you, do you feel you need somebody for support?" he asked me. I was slightly shocked by this.

I thought about it. Alice was great, but she didn't really understand my parents and family. Sonya is good with comforting, but Shay was always the closest to my mum and dad because she always took refuge from her father in our house.

I nodded my head yes and said, "Could Shay come? She was always close to my family," I told Dumbledore.

He nodded and said, "I will get Shay and ask her to accompany you. Please go get your things and be at the front doors in fifteen minutes." I nodded and dashed off to get my things from my room.

_What's happening with mum? Is she okay? What exactly is wrong with her? Is she sick? _

I got the few things I felt I needed packed and left the room in a rush, only to run straight into James. "Oh, sorry," I said in a trance as I walked in the direction of the door.

"Lily," he said. I turned around. It must be something in his voice. It forces my body to respond to it.

"James, I really have to go meet Dumbledore…" I started.

He moved closer, "I'm sorry about your mum. I hope she's fine. Please write to tell me anything that happens," James said. I looked into his eyes.

"I will. I promise," I told him. He pulled me into an embrace and held me for a minute. I would've been quite content just standing there with him, letting all my troubles fade away into the wind, but I knew that I couldn't do that. My mother wanted to see me now, and I needed to be there with her as soon as I possible could.

"I'm sorry, James, but I really have to go now," I told him, pulling away gently.

He half smiled at me and nodded. "Everything will be fine," he said lovingly. I smiled at him before turning to the portrait and walking down to the front doors of the school. Dumbledore and Shay were standing there waiting for me when I got there.

"Sorry, I got sidetracked," I admitted.

Dumbledore smiled. "Young love can do that at times," he said. _Wait, how did he know about James and me? _"But now, we must be off."

We walked out the oak front doors. A slight drizzle fell from the sky. The shy looked ominous, almost as if saying that the day wasn't going to go well. We walked briskly to the front gates of the school in silence except for a few words towards the beginning: "Thanks for coming with me, Shay," I told her quietly.

She smiled; a little worried, but still a smile. "You know that I wouldn't leave you if you wanted me to come with you. Besides, your parents are as good as mine," she said softly. It felt good to be in this close a proximity to my friend when life for me was looking so ill omened.

The drizzle didn't get any stronger, it didn't pour like it always seems to in the movies. It just left the depressing feeling lingering over you. The walk to the front gates of the school seemed to take hours. The walk was filled with worry and confusion filling my mind. It was hard to even imagine that just this morning I felt on top of the world.

When we passed the school gates, Dumbledore insisted on apparating with us near the muggle hospital. We all apparated, the feeling of the air pushing down on me from all sides overtook me, then it stopped. I opened my eyes and saw Dumbledore and Shay standing there in the alley beside the hospital with me.

"If you don't mind, could I have a word with your father?" Dumbledore asked me.

"Er, I guess so. That's his decision to make though," I replied. And Dumbledore led the way into the hospital. I nearly ran to the front desk to ask for my mother. "Mrs. Evans?" I asked.

The nurse looked up at me strangely. It was then that I realized we were still in our robes. "What's your relationship with her?" the nurse as wearily.

"I'm her daughter," I answered.

"Ah, Lily. Yeah, she's been asking for you all morning…"

"What room is she in?" I shouted, cutting off the nurse in mid sentence.

"Room 313. She's not doing too well, mind you," the nurse warned. But I was already taking off down the corridor with Shay at my heels.

The numbers passed slowly. I finally reached the 300s. _301…303…307…310…131! _I stopped abruptly and Shay slammed into the back of me. I quickly turned into the room. Petunia was in the corner, pale as ever. My father was sitting next to the hospital bed my mother was in. It reminded me briefly of how James was always at my bedside all those times I went into the hospital. But that thought was erased completely when I saw my mothers petite form lying in that threatening bed.

She was as still as can be. Her chest was moving lightly, with difficulty, as she breathed. Her breath was ragged and irregular. This was the only sign that she was living at all. Her heavy lidded eyes were barely open. I ran to the bedside and knelt by her side.

"Mum? Mum?" I repeated. Her head titled in the slightest. Her eyes lit up slightly when she saw me.

"Lily," she croaked. A small smile took its place on her face, but it was so brief. I looked at her. She didn't say anything else. It was then that I realized that the ragged breathing had stopped. My mother was dead…

**Wow. That shocked me! It almost wrote itself… Well, 6 reviews is not even close to 18, so I'm a bit disappointed there, but I'm grateful for all my reviews! Thank you:**_** EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, LILYandJAMESareCUTE, Your yellow flower, sc12321, prongsies.lady, and Holy Cross Baby. **_**Ice cream? Where are you? You're always there! Tempe!**

**Has anyone seen Sweeny Todd? What did you think of it? I know, random, I just wanted to know what others thought of it. I loved it, but did anyone else? **

**Review, lolli**


	12. The Funeral

Chapter 12: The Funeral

_My mother had died…_

I felt tears come to my eyes. I had only just gotten here and she was gone. Shay walked over to me as quietly as she could and knelt down beside me to place an arm around me. I saw a tear trail down her face as I wept into her shoulder. Dumbledore was standing silently at the door; I thought I saw a single tear fall down his elderly face. My father was sitting emotionless on his chair and Petunia was sobbing quietly to herself in the corner.

I slowly got up and made my way over to Petunia. I sat down beside her on the floor. She looked up at me gravely. "You know, I think she waited for you." I stared at her, perplexed. I didn't quite understand.

"What do you…"

"I don't think that she was ready to…" Petunia couldn't say the three-letter word. I nodded in understanding. "But when you showed up, she just… went. She was so close to leaving for the past hour and when she saw you, I think she was finally ready. Like we used to see in those forensic television programs," Petunia explained while tears swept down her face.

I hugged my sister, and for the first time in a long time, we were like friends. "She was smiling. She was happy," I told Petunia. Petunia nodded into my shoulder, and we both sobbed together as one.

Shay stood beside us. Silent tears streaming down her face. Yet, she watched Petunia and I smiling. Maybe it was okay that my mother had died. Well, not now, maybe not even soon, but maybe it was okay because she was happy…

I released myself from Petunia and wiped away the wet tears left on my face as fresh ones took over. I looked up to see the doctors surrounding my mother. I got up unsteadily, almost feel before Shay caught me, and walked over to one of them.

The doctor I walked to was a middle age woman. She had short blonde hair that was pulled back from her face and thrown up into a ponytail. She was wearing faded blue jeans under her scrubs.

"Excuse me?" I asked, my voice quavering with the tears that continued down my face, slower than before.

Se turned to me. Her friendly consoling smile reminded me of Alice somehow. "Hello," she said warmly. "What can I do for you?" she asked me.

"I…I was just wondering what… what exactly happened to my… my mother," I told her, my voice still filled with sobs.

The nurse looked at me gravely. "She was your mother, eh? Well, I'm sorry about what happened and everything, but I don't think I'm the most experienced person here. Hold on," she told me as she turned to a tall man who looked to be in his early thirties. "Mike, could you explain to this girl everything that actually happened?"

Mike turned to me and smiled gravely. "It's not that complex, Mallory. Why couldn't you do it?" Mike seemed to be teasing Mallory. Mallory smiled at him and put her hand n her hip. Maybe they were dating, I don't know, but I have much better things to be doing than watching this flirt-fest.

I turned to an older man who was standing nearest to my mother. "Hello?" I questioned.

He turned to me, "Hello," he said in a voice of wisdom. "Are you, by any chance, Lily?" he asked me. I nodded my head yes.

"Could you tell me what exactly happened to my mother?" I asked him, the tears still coming down ever so slowly now.

He gave me a half smile. "I believe I could do that," he said. "Why don't we have a seat." He pulled two chairs from the corner and I took a seat in the one opposite him. Shay soon pulled up a chair beside me.

"What happened to Mrs. Evans was nothing strange. It wasn't an abstract disease, she simply came down with pneumonia and her immune system couldn't fight it off. We think she may have had HIV, a disease that would lower the immune system. If HIV affected her immune system, it would explain how the pneumonia so quickly overtook her. We're going to be doing some tests in the next few days, and when we figured out, if we figure out, what exactly happened, we will be sure to contact you and let you know," The doctor told me. He stood up. "I need to be on my way now, we have a lot of study to do on this body." And with that, he walked away.

"HIV?" Shay questioned.

"Yes, it's a somewhat newly discovered disease. There's no cure. It stands for _Human Immunodeficiency Virus _I'm pretty sure. Like he said, it lowers your immune system to the point where you can't fight off a common cold anymore. I couldn't imagine fighting off an already potentially fatal disease with it…" I informed her.

"Your mum was strong, Lily," Shay told me.

I nodded my head yes. "I hope I can be as strong as her. Sometimes I just don't know though…" I told Shay.

"You will be. I can tell," Shay said smiling.

A few tears still fell down my face over the next three days. Mostly at night before I got to sleep and when I woke up in the morning. James, Sirius, Sonya, Alice, Peter, and Remus came soon for the funeral service. From what James said, Sirius walked into Dumbledore's office and demanded that they all be able to come. Dumbledore was willing to let them all come.

The morning of the funeral was just as dreary as the day we traveled with Dumbledore. In fact, everyday since that day has been rainy and dreary. I wore a black dress that went down to just below my kneecap. I sat in my bedroom, staring in the mirror. I had black circles under my eyes because of my lack of sleep. Or more my lack of staying asleep throughout the night.

I heard a knock on my door before it creaked open. I turned to see James standing there. I got up quickly. "It's time already?" I asked him.

"Not quite, but soon. I just came by. Peter's driving me up the wall with talk of Yvonne. I smiled half heartedly.

"He must be broken that she's gone to them," I said.

"That's all he talks about!" James said overdramatically. A small laugh escaped my lips.

I was looking through my jewelry box. "The gold necklace with red stones, or the white gold with green stones?" I asked James over my shoulder, holding up both of them.

"The white and green," James answered easily.

"Okay…" But my dad cut off my sentence.

"Lily! Petunia! It's time to leave!" he called from the foot of the stairs.

I looked at myself in the mirror. The necklace was my mothers, and accented my eyes well_. James chooses jewelry well_, I thought. "Are you ready, Ms. Evans?" James asked.

"Yup," I said and with one last glance at the necklace that was once my mothers, I turned and walked to the car with James.

The funeral was horrible. It was a good funeral, but a lot of crying from everyone. My father shed a few tears, and didn't talk for the duration. I balled into James' shoulder, Shay and Petunia cried with each other, something I was sure to never see again as long as I lived. Sonya was crying quietly to herself, and a single tear fell down Remus' already pale face.

On top of the people I knew well, there were a dozen other family members and a half dozen close family friends standing in the drizzly morning rain with us.

When it was over, James helped me walk to the car without falling, and we went back to the Potter's, who were hosting a small get together for my father and the teenagers who were going back to Hogwarts tomorrow. It was a quiet luncheon where we shared our good memories of my mother, and then of everything else, instead of lingering in the sad silence.

After the simple lunch, my friends and I all headed up to James' room, leaving the parents to talk amongst themselves. My father had been scarce for words the entire time since I got here. I was worried about his health.

My father was usually quite talkative. He liked to discuss the latest news and what's happening in the world at this moment. He would ordinarily talk to any adult around, and if something big came onto the news, he'd even talk to a child. But lately, his words were far off and distant from planet Earth.

"Lily?" a voice questioned.

"Huh?" I answered suddenly.

Alice was standing before me, looking concerned. "Oh, not much. You just look off in space. Are you sure you're okay with everything?" she asked me in the concerned mother tone.

I nodded. "Yeah, Alice. I'm just worried about my dad. He's not been acting the same since..." Alice nodded in understanding.

"He'll be okay," she reassured me. I smiled. James turned around, obviously listening to our conversation secretly.

"I'll talk to my mum and dad. Don't worry, they'll keep him company and he won't be alone or anything." I smiled at James.

"Thank you," I hugged him briefly, and Alice smiled at the two of us for that brief moment.

**So, 12 reviews for the last chapter, that's amazing! Thank you, thank you, oh my good lord I love my readers! **

**Okay, this is kinda important. So, I'm thinking, because of some obvious mistake like typo things, that I will get a beta reader. What will happen is I will write the chapter, post it here, send it to you, you edit it, send it back, and I replace the unread one with the "Good" one. So, really would like an experienced beta. Please say so in a review or PM if you have experience, or believe yourself to be qualified, to be a beta reader. I simply want this story to be the best that it can be. **

**I liked the little question thing last time, so...**

**Does anyone here listen to mugglecast? What do you think? **

**I am setting these off of things that I enjoy, and I very much so adore mugglecast. **

**Review! lolli**


	13. Attack of the Narwhales

Chapter 13:

**Chapter 13: Attack of the Narwhales**

We arrived at Hogwarts early this morning. Can you believe it's still raining? We had to walk through the pouring rain to Care of Magical Creatures, then to Herbology!

The Slytherins were looking particularly joyous later in Transfiguration class, our final class of the day. Nobody seemed to pleased to see the Slytherins in this exceptionally good mood…

While we sat in Transfiguration, working on our immensely long essays, the class finally found out just what they were so happy about.

I was sitting next to Alice and Shay, and Sonya was on the other side of Alice. Sirius was next to Shay, then James, Remus, and finally Peter. We were working quietly, each to ourselves. The only sound that was heard throughout the classroom was the flipping of the pages as somebody looked for a sentence or definition of a word.

Quite suddenly, we were splattered with black. We all looked up in shock, only to find that our inkbottles had exploded, splattering everything in the close vicinity with ink. Sirius and James immediately stood up in fury, and Sonya looked devastated when she saw that she would have to re-do her entire assignment.

Shay looked angry, but was able to hide her anger by trying so hard to calm Sirius down. Remus, on the other side, was taking the extremely difficult was still in shock of what happened, McGonagall task of calming down James. The class was just looking up when Peter started shrieking. It was strange how much had happened in that one split second.

"Ahh! My eyes! My eyes!" Peter screamed as he clutched his palms over his eyes. McGonagall immediately stood up and ran over to him. After trying unsuccessfully to remove Peter's hands from in front of his eyes, she told us she would be escorting Peter to the Hospital Wing herself. She had just left the room when she walked back in quite quickly with a distressed look upon her face.

"Do not destroy my classroom!" She pronounced every syllable and glared at Sirius before leaving the room once again, not to return as quickly as the first time.

I looked to the Slytherins, who were laughing hysterically. But none of the Slytherins were laughing harder than one, Severus Snape. I looked at him contemptuously. He met my gaze and his laughter ceased slowly. He suddenly looked almost remorseful… _He wasn't getting my sympathy, that's for sure, _I thought bitterly before turning to try and help calm the two raven-haired boys.

"I'm going to murder that twat!" Sirius spat.

"I'm going to help him murder that twat!" James added. We laughed at the looks the boys were giving. They were so angry; yet, you could see that they were almost glad that this happened because it gave them a reason to taunt and prank a Slytherin.

"Okay, but at least wait until we're out of class and aren't in a place were a teacher is bound to show up at any given moment," Alice begged them.

Sirius glared at her, but nodded and James followed suit. They sat back down, cleaned up the mess, and we all started our essays over again.

Sonya had gotten nowhere on her essay by the time class ended because she was trying so hard to remember what she had written word for word. The rest of us got pretty far, Alice and I were nearly done and Remus had completed his essay. James and Sirius got nowhere also because they had been talking in hushed whispers for the remainder of the class, something everyone seemed scared to see.

McGonagall came back looking astonished that everyone and everything was still in one piece. She told us that Peter would be spending the evening in the hospital wing because they were having such a hard time getting the ink out of his eyes. We later found out that it was because the ink had set in his eyes because he refused to open his eyes for the matron.

The Slytherins were looking unhappy that the Marauders weren't putting up a fight. Apparently they expected to have a cursing war with the Marauders in the middle of the Transfiguration classroom. Snape was constantly holding his wand and looking over at James and Sirius in a paranoid kind of way.

When the class ended Alice and I walked out together. We were both concerned about James and Sirius' silent whispers. Neither of us, nor the rest of the school, had ever seen the boys being so quiet. Everyone seemed to know that nothing good could come of this silence.

We left for dinner an hour later. An hour that the halls of Hogwarts were silent as the two boys plotted their revenge sinisterly. It was probably the first time that Hogwarts had been this quiet since before our first year here, before James and Sirius came to the school.

We decided to meet them at dinner because they were "just finishing up" their plans. We agreed and walked down without the boys.

"Wow… Hogwarts is quiet," Remus said. "It's almost peaceful. It's really quite strange," he added. "I don't know if I like it much this way."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," I agreed. There was a long silence.

Suddenly Shay exclaimed, "Oh my goldfish I am so excited for Hogsmead this weekend!" We stared at her strangely.

"Oh my goldfish?" Sonya asked hesitantly.

Shay looked stunned. "Well, what else are you supposed to say? Oh my gosh? That's just _so_ overrated!" Shay said. It seemed to me that she was over-exaggerating just a little bit, but nobody bothered to ask any more questions, but instead moved on to the subject of the upcoming trip to Hogsmead.

"I can't wait to all sit at a table in the Three Broomsticks again!" Shay exclaimed.

I looked at her funnily. "Shay?" I questioned.

"Yeah," she responded.

"We've never all sat together at the Three Broomsticks," I told her.

She looked in thought. "Well, there's a first time for everything!" she cried out.

I looked a bit uncomfortable telling her that I, nor James, would be able to attend this groupliness in Hogsmead. "Er, Shay? James is… I mean, I said that I'd… Me and James…"

"What do you mean, Lily?" she screeched at me.

I was startled by the sudden force of her words and wound up spluttering mine because of my being startled. "James to go me asked and…" I trailed off, realizing I was making no coherent sentence.

Shay gasped loudly. "Oh Lily!" She cried, suddenly seeming ecstatic and hugging me. I was, once again in too much shock to even attempt to hug her back. Not to mention I had no clue why she was hugging me. "Why didn't you just say that you and James had plans and that they were private? I have been one of the people trying to get you to go out with him for over a year now; I would have understood!" she told me.

"Yeah… sorry… didn't think…" I muttered incomprehensively.

"Oh, it's okay Lily! We'll try not to have too much fun without you, right guys?" she asked, turning to the group.

"Yeah!" Sirius replied enthusiastically.

Remus fidgeted a bit. "Remus?" Shay asked. "You are coming to Hogsmead to spend the day with us, right?"

"Well… I was going to… but then Emmaline, she's a year younger than us," he added. We all understood now whom he was talking about. "She asked me to Hogsmead and I figured that I had nothing too important to do and…" We all understood by now anyway, and he needn't continue. Shay didn't look as pleased as she had with my story, and Sonya looked downright angry, but Shay tried to move on quickly, interrogating Alice next.

"And you, Alice?" she asked the girl.

"Frank's meeting me there. He got the day off so that we could spend some time together," Alice explained with much more ease than either Remus or myself.

Shay glared a glare that looked more like a joke than anything else. "I guess that's an _okay_ excuse," she muttered to Alice. Alice rolled her eyes dramatically when Shay turned away from her, and we all began laughing.

We made it to the Great Hall and just moments later, James and Sirius walked with looking completed with mischievous grins on their faces. "Good evening ladies!" Sirius called over to us. "Remus, Peter," he nodded his head to the two men.

"Hey Sirius," Remus said after swallowing a bite of his meal. Sirius sat down between Remus and Shay, while James sat on the other side of me.

"Hey! What about James?" James exclaimed.

Remus looked at him and rolled his eyes in the slightest. "I don't recall you greeting me either!" Remus told him.

"But… still! You didn't greet me, Moon—Remus!" James covered up quickly. Luckily, nobody noticed the slight slip-up, especially Lily.

"Fine!" Remus called dramatically, "James!" he exclaimed. Remus stood from his seat and walked to where the boy sat, shaking James' hand vigorously. "It's a pleasure!"

"Hello Remus!" James exclaimed smiling. "Now that was better. Sirius, what's the time?" James asked suddenly.

"Er…" Sirius checked the time quickly as Remus sat down. "Only two and a half more minutes, Jamesie!" He exclaimed with glee.

"Would this be the thing you've been needing to whisper about all afternoon?" Alice asked curiously.

"Yup!" Sirius exclaimed. "And you're going to find out what it is in just one minute…"

James and Sirius looked at each other while the rest of us were completely silent, waiting for the time to count down to when the big show would occur. Finally, there was a loud bang! Everyone in the Great Hall turned to the entranceway. There, we saw the doors fly open against the wall and soon, a mob of what looked like floating balloon animals were coming in and aiming straight for one, Severus Snape.

As the balloon animals got closer, and I looked harder at what they actually were, Severus got pale and looked scared. I realized quite abruptly what the animals were, narwhales.

A narwhale is a strange creature. They look like whales, hence the term nar_whale_. The only exception is that they have this long unicorn looking thing sticking out of what I would think would be there nose. They were strange looking animals, in my opinion.

Something in my head swiftly clicked and I remembered something Sev had said years before. _"I hate narwhales. I'm kind of afraid of them actually. They just… They frighten me."_

"How did you know he's afraid of narwhales?" I asked James, evidently impressed with the thought put into this prank.

"I was… In fifth year I was… You remember, I was kind of," he paused in thought of a word to use. "Stalking you?"

I remembered these memories well. "Yes. So…" I encouraged.

"That must've been when Sniv—Snape told you he hated them because when we were thinking earlier, it just came to me," James explained.

"Well, I hope to see him scream, so we need to stop the chatting!" Lily told the boy on her left before she turned and watched the real action.

It was only when the narwhales were close to the Hufflepuffs that the group realized how large they are. They were each the size of two students, and there were about twenty of them. As they crept up on the Slytherin table agonizingly slowly, Severus began to freak out more than he already was.

It looked like he was trying his hardest not to scream. Instead he was sweating and shaking uncontrollably and when one got just close enough to him and was directly in front of him, he let out a screech that could have been mistaken for a girl's. The great hall erupted into fits of laughter and, quite suddenly, the narwhale balloons exploded and ink shot at the Slytherins.

The Slytherins sat in shock, glaring at the Gryffindor table, covered in color-changing ink. "It's like permanent marker stuff too! You can't just whisk it away with a wand, you have to scrub down the old fashion way," James told me.

"That's pretty thought through for only one afternoon of planning," I told him grinning.

"Lily! We're The Marauders! Have some faith in our pranking ability!" James exclaimed. I laughed at the look upon his face.

"You two, detention. Two weeks. My office," Professor McGonagall said as she walked by. I think that she's getting used to having the Marauders around…

**A bit short, but I was having block severely. I was going to put Hogsmead in with this chapter but I didn't want you to have to wait any longer for this chapter. On the upside, I started writing the Hogsmead and it will not take three weeks to write. **

**So, I guess I've been busy. I saw Prince Caspian and loved it. Did anyone else see this great movie? Was the first or second movie better? Any comments?**

**I get out of school in ten days (June 11) and, though I want to write some different stuff this summer as well, I'm hoping you can expect more updates on this story!**

**I just put out one-shot, Hazel Eyes. I've gotten good reviews so far, so check it out and tell me what you think!**

**Review, lollipop**


	14. Dreams Turning to Visions

Chapter 14: Hogsmead

**Chapter 14: Hogsmead **

**A/N: The last chapter (sorry I didn't add this in that author's note) wasn't really anything relevant to the story (as you may have been able to tell). I've decided, like the Sirius turning into a squirrel chapter, I will have a semi-random not quite significant fun chapter whenever I have writer's block, or about every six chapters. **

"Lily! Wake up already!" Alice said for what must've been the millionth time. I had to patrol late last night, therefore didn't want to get up this morning.

"Here, allow me," Shay said. I was suddenly shoved from the bed. I landed on the floor with a loud thump and my head throbbed.

"Ow!" I exclaimed as my brain pounded inside of my head. "What was that for?" I bellowed as I got to my feet.

"I think James would be a little disappointed if you skipped your first date with him," Shay said as she tried to pick out a shirt to wear to Hogsmead. "And you have to get ready so that your hair doesn't look like a mess." Shay turned to me. "Kind of like it does now," she added. I glared at her and she smirked over back to me.

I acted annoyed at my friends and even slammed the door when I went to take a shower, but I was really excited for Hogsmead. Wow, last year if I would've been going to Hogsmead with James Potter all of my friends would be slapping me to see if I was sane.

But I was sane, and going to Hogsmead with James was something I had been looking forward to all week. I might even be a little nervous, in an excited way. But I wouldn't tell anyone that. Nobody really had to know anyway.

I showered slowly. When I stepped out of the bathroom, my clothes were laid out for me. "This," Shay started, indicating to the clothes. "Is what you'll be wearing?"

I looked at the miniskirt and long sleeve low cut shirt. "No, I will be wearing a sweater and my good jeans," I told her.

She glared at me. "No! You cannot wear that! You simply must wear the skirt!" She whined. I rolled my eyes and dug through my truck til I found my jeans and sweater. I got dressed quickly. Shay was glaring at me the entire time.

By the time I had dried and brushed my hair, found my socks, and brushed my teeth, I was late. "Bye!" I called as I dashed from the room.

My friends laughed and said that they'd see me in Hogsmead later. I ran down the steps two at a time and tripped over my foot on the way off of the last step. I stumbled as I tried to steady myself, and thought I would wind up on the floor for sure. But someone caught me before I fell.

"Hey, Evans! You shouldn't be trying to injure yourself, James can't be that bad to go on a date with!" The familiar voice joked. I looked up to see I had fallen into Sirius Black's arms.

"What's with the last names, Black?" I asked him. He chuckled lightly.

"Oh, I just feel in that kind of a mood today. James is waiting for you though. What a frantic mess he is! You better go find him so he'll calm down a bit." Sirius told me as he set me on my feet and steadied me. I nodded and walked off quickly. I tripped again over someone else's foot on the way out of the common room and could hear Sirius laughing and was sure he was shaking his head at my clumsiness today.

I ran down the stairs, taking them one at a time, so as not to trip again, and ran to the entrance hall where James was pacing. He looked nervous, and impatient. I took a deep breath and walked over to him, trying to look more confident than I felt.

"Hey," I piped up as I neared him. He hopped around and smiled wide.

"Ready?" he asked me. I could sense the nervousness from earlier, but he was doing a good job to cover it up.

"Yeah, I didn't keep you waiting too long, did I?" I asked.

He shrugged, "Not that long. I was early though," he said. I had a feeling I was a bit later than he led me to believe.

"That's good," I said. He agreed and the subject turned to the Quidditch team this year.

"It really is looking good; now that all the positions are filled and the players are used to playing from the practices. I think we could win it this year… God would I love to finally win it…" he muttered.

I smiled. "You'll be able to do it. You have the desire to win it, more so than the Slytherins," I added. He smiled.

"Where do you want to go first, Ms. Evans?" James asked me politely with a hint of a smirk on his face. The smirk must be from the jokester trying so hard to be polite.

"It really doesn't matter to me," I told him. "How about the Three Broomsticks?"

He sighed, "Thank God you didn't say Madam Puddifoot's." I laughed as he said this while he walked me into the Three Broomsticks. He sent me to a small table in the corner and went up to get us some drinks. He came back several minutes later with two butterbeers.

"For the beautiful redhead," he said handing me my drink. I blushed lightly and took the drink. He seemed uncomfortable with the silence that had taken the last sixty seconds away.

"Why are you so nervous?" I asked suddenly. "It's just me."

He looked up startled. "I'm not nervous," he lied.

"Don't lie to me. I can tell, you're nervous. I just want to know why." I told him.

He looked me in the eye. "I'm nervous because I'm actually going out with you." I tilted my head to tell him I was still missing something and he smiled lightly. "I just don't want to say the wrong thing and have you hate me again. You do realize how long it's taken me to get to this date, don't you? I just don't want to blow it because of something immensely stupid." I smiled as he looked at his drink, fiddling with the straw.

"It would take more than one slip up of the mouth to make me hate you again," I told him. He looked up at me smiling.

"So, are you for the Cannons this year?" James asked. Quidditch again, typical, I thought.

"No, I like the Harpies. They're going to take it for sure!" I told him.

He laughed. "You know that they don't stand a chance, don't you?" James asked.

"Twenty galleons they win the cup," I challenged with a grin. "The Cannons' chance is much slimmer than the Harpies though."

"Yeah right! Okay though, twenty galleons on the Cannons." We continued chatting through our butterbeers and soon we were on our way out of the Three Broomsticks and into the cool wind.

"Where to next?" I asked him.

"Hm, I need to get some new quills, and stop into Quality Quidditch Supplies, if you wouldn't mind accompanying me," he added.

"Okay, I need some more ink anyway." And we walked off to buy our supplies. James got four new quills and a container of invisible ink, while I got two new ink containers and some parchment.

James bought something in Quality Quidditch Supplies while I listened to a program about the quidditch standings this year so far. We walked out, James blabbering about how the Wasps shouldn't be this far in the lead.

"Ready to find those insane people we call friends?" James asked me. I nodded.

"Where'd they go anyway?" I asked him.

"I told Sirius to meet us in the Hogs Head. Much Quieter and more spacey than the Three Broomsticks," he informed me. I nodded in understanding. I was a bit disappointed our time together alone was over.

We entered the Hogs Head and immediately saw our friends. Sirius waved like a maniac for no reason in particular. Sonya looked ready to kill, no doubt the fact Remus and Emmaline were on a date at the moment had her angry and disappointed. I couldn't help but feel bad for her… Shay looked excited to see us, and I guess that she was worried about Sonya, and Peter smiled as we approached.

"Hey, what'd you get us?" James asked as we walked over. Shay eyed me curiously, trying to read the expression on my face, no doubt. I knew she wanted me to sit next to her so that I could tell her how everything went. I sighed reluctantly. I really didn't want to have to gush everything out right now. _Couldn't she wait till we got back to the dorms? _I wondered hopefully.

"Two butterbeers for the lovely lady and the, what was that you used to call him?" Sirius asked me. "Oh!" He suddenly remembered. "Arrogant toe-rag!" I flushed an awful shade of scarlet and James glared daggers at his friend. Sirius ignored him, slid my butterbeer down the table to me and threw James' at his face. James caught it quickly, still glaring.

"So?" Shay whispered excitedly when I sat down.

I sighed. "I'll tell you everything tonight." I put extra emphasis on the word 'everything' and she smiled and nodded. We got to talking, and talked until Remus showed up with Emmaline.

"Hi." He said sheepishly. Sonya glared into her butterbeer, Shay glared at Emmaline, and I tried to be happy for Remus and supportive of Sonya at the same time. This task was nearly impossible.

"Hey, Remmy!" Sirius jumped up and shook hands avidly with Emmaline. "Emmaline…"

She cut him off. "It's Emma."

"Emma," he corrected. "I'm Sirius Black, I'm sure you've heard of me before, sexiest man Hogwarts has ever seen."

Her forehead ceased slightly. "I've seen you around, but I never actually paid that close attention to you. I think my dorm mate's in love with you though…" She looked thoughtful and Sirius looked offended.

"James?" Emma exclaimed.

"Hey," James waved up at her.

"Hi! I've heard of you, of course! Quidditch extraordinaire… My friend is dying to beat you in the cup this year. I know I should have house pride, but we really don't stand a chance." She and Remus sat down and Sirius glared at James as he, too, took his seat.

James and Emma got into avid discussion about quidditch and the teams and the standings. I felt a feeling in the pit of my stomach. It made me want to injure Emma badly. I realized that this was jealousy. I never actually believed it felt so… strong! I quickly tried to focus my attention on something else, anything else.

"Hey, Shay?" I asked after a few moments of pure torture with no distraction in plain sight.

She looked over at me. "What?"

"I'm going to head back up to the school, you want to come? I think Alice's back." I pleaded with her through my eyes.

"Sure," she said. "Sonya, do you want to come?" Sonya leapt from her seat in less than a second.

"Yup, let's go!" I looked back, but didn't bother to say goodbye to James. He was so intrigued with the conversation that he was barely on the same planet as I was. I smiled at a very discouraged looking Remus and a bored to death Sirius before leaving.

I vowed I wouldn't let the floodgates to my eyes open until I was in the head common room. We reached the school after what seemed to take a century. "I think I'm going to go read a bit before bed." I told my friends in a bit of a daze.

"But Lily, you promised to spill about everything that happened!" Shay exclaimed. "And you don't look well. I think that maybe you should spend another night with us in the Gryffindor dormitories. Please?"

I hesitated. "Shay, I really don't want to talk about anything right now." I was sure that I still looked hurt from the jealousy earlier.

"You don't have to tell us anything now." Sonya said. "But you look like you need some company tonight." Shay looked like she wanted information, but would oblige to me just staying the night.

I nodded to Sonya. "Okay." We walked up to the girl's dormitory in silence. Alice was waiting on her bed reading a magazine when we showed up. She looked up in excitement, to hear what bad happened with James and me probably. Her expression soon changed to confusion at the look on my face.

"What happened?" She was already off of the bed and on her way towards us.

"We left James sitting with Remus' girlfriend…"

"Whom he was getting very friendly with!" Shay cut in.

"A bored stiff Sirius and a crestfallen Remus." Sonya continued.

Alice looked appalled. "What happened? What was James doing? Why was he so intrigued?" Alice was bubbling with questions.

They all looked to me. I sighed in exhaustion and dejection. "I don't really know. We walked in happy and everything. Then Remus and Emma walked in happily as well. And Sirius was flirting." Shay was unhappy with this. "And then Emma threw herself into conversation with James about quidditch. I couldn't even say goodbye. His attention was completely gone." I was whispering by the end of it. The tears were threatening to all, but I pushed them back.

"That ass!" Alice exclaimed after a minute. I couldn't help but let out a small giggle at this. I had never heard Alice talk about someone in that way before. Shay and Sonya both chuckled also. "I'm sorry for my language," She apologized. "I just can't believe it. He always seemed so focused on you… I never thought… I really want to go kick his…" She didn't finish her sentence. A single tear fell and I fought more than ever to keep the rest from falling.

Alice was hugging her first, but Lily shrugged her away lightly, not wanting to hurt her. "Look, I'm really tired and… It's just been a bad evening. Can I go to sleep?" I asked.

"Of course. Everything will work out, Lily." Alice promised. I smiled, but I didn't have as much confidence.

I drifted off into an awful sleep fill with unwanted visions, otherwise known as _dreams._ I wouldn't have called them dreams in the slightest. But nightmare was a bad word also. Vision. That was the only word that seemed to fit…

Oh my god I'm sorry. I really am! I couldn't use Internet at my mum's and when at my dad's life is more hectic and I'm sick right now. It's one o'clock in the morning and I'm already suffering from lack of sleep from being at my mum's where the people upstairs move furniture above my bedroom every Sunday at seven o'clock. I know, pathetic excuses, but as tired/sick as I am, I'm going to start the next chapter now.

**In the meantime, because it seems you can never know when I'll update, I suggest **_**I Need You **_**by Krstna. It's very long, should keep you busy. Really great story!**

**And now for a lame question… Any Twilight fans? I'm currently rereading the series and was wondering if anyone else had a passion for the exceptional tale. **


	15. Mistakes

Chapter 15 Chapter 15

There were three visions throughout the course of my night, all scenarios between James, Emma, and myself. The first vision depicted the exact same thing that had happened at the Hogs Head. The only difference was the pain. The pain that I felt in the vision was worse than it had been in the Hogs Head earlier because I was no longer confused or befuddled by the concept, I knew what was going to happen and it hurt me more than I thought imaginable when asleep.

It turned out both the second and third visions would top the first on the scale of how much they hurt me.

The second was the same as the first with a slight difference. There was more to the vision. After James and Emma had talked, the hurt, empty feeling filling my chest, James left. Emma talked to me though. Bragged to me about what chemistry she and James had. The worst part was I wouldn't wake up and couldn't leave Emma. This one hurt more than the first but could not be compared to the third.

And the third and final one was unbearable. It was a different scene all together. James and I were standing in a corridor when Emma had come along. James had very clearly shown whom he wanted to be with, and the person was not me. I watched in horror as she kissed him and he didn't oblige in the slightest. But it was what happened next that was the worst. He broke their kiss and looked into my sorrowed face and he laughed.

I had woken from the last one with tears falling down my cheeks already. I couldn't believe the intensity of the final vision; the way that it left my chest feeling like there was a gaping, empty hole ripped through it. The feeling of aloneness overpowered me and I knew that I wouldn't be going back to sleep, no matter how tired I was.

I sat in my bed and waited as the tears ceased and my breathing became normal. I got up out of bed and picked up a throw blanket as I walked down to the common room. It was four o'clock in the morning. Nobody was down there. I lounged on the sofa in front of the dimmed fire and stared into the ashes of what used to be a roaring blaze. I cuddled into my blanket tighter, not for warmth, but for support.

I don't know exactly how long I sat there, but the common room door opened and my head snapped to the person in a flash. I smiled weakly at Remus as he walked in. He seemed shocked to see me sitting here.

"Hey," I said. It was more of a whisper and a croak mixed together than actually speaking. I cleared my throat as he smiled at me and went to sit down in an armchair.

"Couldn't sleep?" He guessed. I nodded.

"I guess I could, but I don't really want to," I admitted.

He nodded, not needing any further explanation. "I'm sorry about earlier. I didn't realize she would cling so much to James. I'm assuming she used me just to get to James."

"It's not your fault. I… maybe I just couldn't hold his attention or… maybe it just wasn't right." I sighed in desperation, fighting back anything that could be left of moisture in my eyes.

"Lily, James loves you. He has loved you for years, he can't be drifted that easily."

I sighed. "I just don't get it! It seemed like everything was fine one minute and the next everything was entirely wrong! There was so much more… chemistry between them then there ever was with James and I. They had so much in common; how can I even attempt to compete?" Oh no! The tears were going to bubble over. I tried my hardest to make them stay in my eye socket.

"Lily, James shows more interest in you any day than he would show to Emma," Remus tried to say. Unfortunately, it was a lie, and James paid much more close attention to her than to me.

"You're wrong," I whispered. The silent tears fell without my permission. I forced myself to stop them, and after a few minutes, I had my emotions under control again.

Nothing more was said between the two of us as we stared into the remains of the fire. There was nothing more that needed to be said. Everything seemed clear to me, even if I didn't like it.

At seven we both went to our dorms to get ready for classes. I wasn't Lily any longer. I took a shower that was so hot it could've nearly burnt my skin. I was freezing the entire time. I got dressed without talking to my friends.

My friends looked immensely worried. I felt even worse that I was doing this to them, but how're you supposed to help them with what they're feeling when you can barely feel yourself?

We were down in the great hall by eight. The Marauders closely following us and sitting near us at the table. James sat across from me and smiled. "So, was yesterday good enough that I get to take you out again?" His arrogant voice annoyed me. Suddenly I could feel anger, and a lot of it.

I looked up and glared at him furiously. "Are you talking to me?" I asked in mock astonishment. Our friends looked over worriedly.

James opened his mouth to say something. "What are you talking about, Lily?" That arrogant…

"You don't know what I'm talking about? You don't realize that you took me out, only to ignore me half the day yesterday?" I was screaming at him. He looked taken aback, and angry.

"I ignored you? You were the one who chose to sit as far away as possible from me!" He roared.

"So because I sat with a friend you see it fit to forget I even exist? What logic that is!" I was clearly hysterical. "Meanwhile, you talk to Emma! Oh great Emma…" Tears fell down my face. I knew I needed to get out of there fast before the reality of the pain sunk in. The next words were deadly whispers filled with meaning. "Do you realize you are breaking my heart, or is it an unconscious thing for you now?" I whipped around after seeing the hurt look on his face and stomped from the great hall.

I barely made it out of the hall before the real tears started. My legs threatened to break and leave my motionless corpse lying there for the school to see. I managed to make it to the stairs before I fell onto a single step. I put my face in my hands and cried.

"Lily?" It was _him_.

No, I wasn't talking to him! I stood and nearly ran up the stairs. "Lily!" He called as he chased after me easily. It wasn't much of a challenge for him.

"Go away! I don't want to be around you!" I screamed in his face, which, when I whipped around, halted just inches from mine. I groaned in agony. "Please," I begged. "Do you not realize there's not much left to damage? Can't you give up now?" My voice was wavering and pathetic as my legs gave out suddenly.

I let out an unexpected scream while I fell onto the step I was standing on. James caught me, after I had already hit the ground, and pulled me up. Why did he have to be so strong? I groaned again and attempted to detach myself from him.

"Lily?" I didn't look at him. Why should I? He'd probably just hurt me again!

"Lily, look at me," He ordered. I shook my head, the tears still falling. Where the hell were they all coming from? How did I manage to fit them all inside my eyes? Why won't they just stop?

"She doesn't want to be around you, Potter, so you might as well let her go." Someone snarled. I turned and could make out the Slytherin robes. I knew who it was, though my blurred vision kept me from seeing the person in any amount of detail.

"Listen Sniv…" James started.

"Listen to him," I begged in a whisper. James looked at me with hurt etched in every line of his face.

"What?" He asked.

"Just listen to him." I sighed at the look on his face. "Being with you has brought more hurt to me than happiness. I'm sick of being hurt, James." His grip on the top half of my arms loosened as my words seeped through his skin. Would I really feel better after this? I'd just have to get used to it. And so would he.

James let me go after a moment. He blinked dazedly and opened him mouth to say something repeatedly. Then, he walked away.

No, no, no! The look on his face tortured my mind. Maybe I wouldn't get used to this. There was a good chance I just made the biggest mistake of my life. But maybe I could fix it, that is, if these damned tears ever ceased!

I stomped back to my head girl room, ignoring Severus as I went. He looked hurt by my lack of interest in him. Great! Another person who I hurt today! I collapsed into my bed and skipped class.

Classes were suddenly unimportant to me. It wasn't worth it if I had to see him. Them. Anyone…

So I sat in my bed with my knees resting on my chin. I ended this mayhem; I should feel relieved. I wasn't going to get hurt anymore! So why was I already hurting now?

I sighed and realized I had, in fact, made a mistake. A mistake I had no clue how to fix. I tried to think of what my friends would say.

_Just go say "Sorry, my mistake! I really love you!" _Yes, that would be Shay. Unfortunately, my dignity refuses to allow me to do that.

_Why did you do that? Lily that was a mistake in the first place! Why? _That would be Sonya and her useless babbling.

_Talk to Sirius, he'd have an idea, I'm sure. _And that would be Alice. Wait! Talking through Sirius! It's brilliant!

I ran from my room, not even caring I looked like a royal disaster, and went to find Sirius. It was six-thirty. He wasn't in the Great Hall. I dashed up to check the Gryffindor common room. Much to my dismay, he wasn't there either. I ran up to check the boy's dorms. Remus was reading a book when I opened the door.

Oops, I forgot to knock. "Hi Remus, sorry about that. Do you know where Sirius is?" Remus looked like he was about to laugh at my disheveled appearance.

"He and Peter took James to the kitchens." I groaned. Why did Sirius have to bring him?

"Thanks Remus," I turned and shut the door as I walked away.

I trudged down the stairs and collapsed into a squishy armchair. I would wait for Sirius to show up then. And so I waited. And waited. And waited.

God dammit, Sirius! Where the hell are you? I wondered furiously. After another twenty minutes, he and Peter walked through the door. Lucky for me, James wasn't with them.

I sighed in relief and stood up to make my way to them. I hadn't thought about their reactions toward me, but I never imagined like this.

Sirius glared daggers at me as Peter attempt to make a look that closely resembled Sirius'. I flinched at the look Sirius was giving me.

"What do you want, Evans?" Sirius asked, his voice filled with hatred.

I gaped at him. I tried to say something, but words refused to form in my mouth. "I… I wanted you… your… help." I managed to stutter.

I looked at me incredulously. "You actually expect me to help you?" His voice was skeptical. I nodded sheepishly. "Why would I help you? No, Evans. You're getting out of this one on your own." With that he and Peter walked up to where Remus waited.

I was still for minutes, hours maybe. I couldn't move. My legs wouldn't move.

I should've seen this coming. It should've been obvious that James' friends wouldn't be happy with me. Even Remus didn't seem as lighthearted as usual.

So where did this leave me? Alone, nobody wanting to talk to me. It's not as though I hadn't felt bad enough before realizing everyone seemed to hate me, but now I wanted to cry. I wanted to feel something! But the tears I'd hated having had dried out before I actually wanted to have them.

I began to sob uncontrollably, though no tears were involved in this process. I sank into the same chair and wrapped my arms around my legs.

Maybe I would break. Maybe I would just fall to pieces here in this chair with all the common room watching me.

"Lily!" The voice was scolding. I looked up and saw Shay, closely followed by Alice and Sonya, standing before me. "How could you? That was totally uncalled for and now look who you've hurt!"

I held up my hand to stop Shay. "If this is all you want to tell me, I already know this. I know I hurt him, and Sirius and Peter already showed me their hatred to me. Please, Shay, I felt bad enough before the school hated me, can we not have this conversation now?" I begged. Alice frowned at my dry voice, vacant of any real feeling.

Shay still looked angry and was about to say something else, but thankfully Alice stopped her. "Shay, she's right. I think she's suffered enough all ready. Give her a break. Let's just deal with how to fix this now." I love Alice.

"Thanks," I murmured. 

"Lily, you do realize the only thing you can do is to talk to James yourself. Though the fact that he doesn't want to be within a ten-foot radius of you smashes that plan in half… Okay, I know this is so middle school, but I think the only way you're going to be able to talk to him is if you leave him a note saying how sorry you are and that you'd like to talk to him."

I nodded, knowing Alice must be right. I didn't like the idea, but I would do it.

**So, weird place to leave it, but that is already over two thousand words and I think I can post the next chapter soon enough that you won't be too angry with me. 7 reviews last chapter, that's a hell of a lot more than I deserve. Maybe if I can keep up the updates I can get the reviews back into the teens! Oh well, dreams… Review!**

**Anyone here read Wake, Unwinds, or The Unspoken? Not very prominent books, but very, very good!**


	16. Something to Try Again

Chapter 16 Chapter 16

I sat upon my bed with a wastebasket by my side, some parchment before me, a bottle of in, and a quill. The wastebasket was full already with notes or letters that weren't good enough. I continued writing…

_James, _

What could I say now? Well, sorry would be good.

_I'm so sincerely sorry about what I said earlier. _That was good. A little cheesy, but definitely true!_ I know I can't say that I didn't mean it, but it was a mistake. Only, I didn't realize it was a mistake until after it was made. If that even makes sense. Please, please talk to me. And if you could convince… everyone to stop glaring at me whenever I walk into a room, that would be nice too. Even though I probably deserve it. _

_Again, I'm sorry. Please talk to me again, Lily. _

I guess that would have to do. It was the best one written so far and my hand throbbed. I walked out to put the note in his room or on his door. But when I got halfway to his door, the portrait opened, and he walked in. He ignored me completely. That hurt a good bit.

"James?" I asked before he could make it all the way to his door. He stopped, he didn't turn to look at me, he just stopped.

"Yes?" His voice was annoyed and hurt. That didn't make me feel better either.

I exhaled. "I… I'm sorry about what- what I said… earlier. I…"

"Don't say you didn't mean it!" He roared as he whirled around to face me, cutting of my sentence. "Because your face very clearly said you meant every word!"

"I… no, I guess I did mean it. But it was a mistake…" I tried to explain but he kept cutting off my sentences.

"A mistake? You meant everything you said, how is that making a mistake?" He sounded incredulous.

"I thought I meant it, when I was saying it. But…you haven't seen me all afternoon! The chances are very high I was just as distressed as you were! The only difference is my friends didn't choose to skip classes to console me!" I was getting infuriated now.

"You also chose to shun yourself from said classes, therefore your friends had no clue how you were feeling! I, on the other hand, went to my classes and people could very clearly see what I was feeling! Don't try to play a sympathy card, Evans, you haven't got anything that deserves my, or anyone else's sympathy!" He turned and stalked into his room, slamming the door after him.

I stood there. I don't know what hurt the most, the tone of his voice, how much his words were true, or the fact he called me 'Evans', just like Sirius had earlier… I made my feet take me to the Gryffindor common room, a place where I very clearly wasn't welcome, and up to the girls dorms.

Alice sat on her bed looking at a magazine. Was she addicted to them or something? Her eyes looked up as I walked through the door, my crumpled note in hand.

She got up and came toward me instantly. She was standing before me before the others had gotten to me and she walked me to a seat on her bed. "Things didn't go well?" She asked me, already knowing the answer.

I shook my head, unsure of how steady my voice would be. "I thought the note would have softened him up," Sonya contemplated.

I finally spoke. "It might have if he had gotten to read the note." They looked confused. "He walked in when I was going to put the note on his door. I decided I'd talk to him then. He… we just ended up in a screaming fight and he called me Evans and stomped off. I didn't feel like being alone, so I came here."

"He called you Evans?" Alice was outraged. "Excuse me, I would like to go have a word with that boy!" Alice stood. I had only seen Alice get confrontational a few times.

"Alice, you don't have to…" I mumbled, but she cut me off.

"I want to, Lily. Do you happen to have the note you wrote still? And I'm going to need your password." She said.

I told her the password and handed her the note. "I won't make things worse for you, Lily. I'll make sure you aren't any worse off." I nodded with a smile that was forced, but thanked her. She smiled sadly back before moving out the door to the distant world…

I tried to stay awake until Alice got back, but my eyelids were heavy after my overly dramatic day and lack of sleep the night before. I don't actually remember falling asleep, but I do remember waking up the next morning.

I stretched on Alice's bed as I awoke. Shay and Sonya were already getting ready for breakfast.

"Good you're up, we were just going to wake you!" Shay exclaimed.

"Where's Alice?" I mumbled after realizing she wasn't there.

Shay and Sonya both looked faintly worried. "Don't know. She never came back after leaving last night." Shay said.

"Oh." Was my big response. We finished getting ready and headed down to the great hall. We sat with Sirius, Remus, and Peter.

"Morning!" Shay exclaimed as she sat next to Sirius who kissed her on the cheek. Sonya and I sat next to Remus across from the other three.

Sirius didn't look at me or acknowledge I was there at all. "Where's Alice?" Remus asked us, or more like Shay and Sonya. I was getting a bit annoyed with this.

"We're not sure." Sonya said. Shay cut in and finished the story.

"She went to go scream with James last night and never came back."

"What'd she want with James?" Sirius asked.

"Well, Lily went to talk to James and he wound up screaming at her. Through her apology, I might add!" She said as Sirius gave her a look that clearly said "Evans deserved it".

"Anyway," Shay continued. "Alice wasn't happy and she went to see him and didn't come back."

"Weird." Remus commented after a moment. Shay nodded, her mouth being full of toast.

The subject changed to our Transfiguration essay due today which Sirius forgot to do. "12 inches? I'll never be able to get that done!" He complained.

"You should have done it over the past week." Remus told him.

Sirius pouted. "Can't I copy yours, Remus?" The raven-haired boy begged.

"No!" Remus exclaimed.

"Why?" Sirius whined.

"First, it's cheating, and second, your writing level isn't anywhere _near_ mine!" Remus told him. Sirius pouted and attempted to glare at Remus.

"Hey guys!" Alice called as she approached with James at her side.

"Where've you been?" Shay asked Alice.

"The password must've changed last night and I couldn't find anyone because by the time I'd talk through to this numb skull it was late. I ended up staying in your room, Lily. I hope you don't mind." Alice told me.

"I wasn't in it, so it's fine." I assured her, wondering if James was talking to me.

For the duration of breakfast James was silent. I swear I caught him stealing glances at me when he thought I wasn't looking, but he didn't say a word.

On the way to classes I tried to stay with the rest of the group, though he made endless attempts to get me alone. _He was the one who yelled at me, now he can wait to apologize, _I told myself.

Finally, after dinner, I had to go up to the head common room to catch up on post-drama homework buildup. I didn't want to be distracted, so I chose against going to the Gryffindor common room.

I sat down at the small table with my books, ink, and parchment and began the essays I needed to catch up on. It was an hour and a half before James walked in. I attempted to ignore him, but couldn't when he began to talk to me.

I looked up from my mess of homework to where he was standing. "I just searched the entire school for you and you were right here the entire time!" He seemed annoyed with himself. I managed to smile through the anger I was _supposed_ to be feeling right now.

He walked over and took the chair on the other side of the small table. He sighed. "Where to start…"

"I guess I should start." I interrupted. "I'm sorry that I said… anything that I said! I thought that without you, I wouldn't be hurt anymore and my life would be better." I confessed.

"And how'd that work out for you? Because for me, that wasn't the best thing." He smiled dryly.

"I was very, very wrong. I hurt myself more when I left you yesterday than you could have ever hurt me." I was staring at the table.

The room was quiet for a moment. "And now I guess I should apologize." He began. I looked at him confused. "Without my stupidity and complete ignorance of you, none of this would have happened. Also," he added before I could say anything. "I should apologize for not letting you apologize last night."

I smiled. "I overreacted." I said simply. "To the Hogsmead incident." _James was way more than I deserved if he could seriously sit here and admit to a girl that he was wrong,_ thought to myself.

"That you did." James smiled at my pouty glare. "You said it, may I remind you!" We both laughed away some of the tension from the past two days.

That was one thing I loved about being with James, fights never lasted long. Though they felt like they lasted weeks, they didn't last long at all.

"I… I think I love you, you know." The words came from my mouth before I could realize I was saying them or stop them. I flushed a shade of scarlet and looked back at the table.

I peeked a look at James' shocked face. "Wow. That was… unexpected." I could feel myself grow warmer realizing he didn't feel the same way. The hot tears stung behind my eyes and I worked to go back to my essays and keep my eyes from betraying me.

He seemed to realize a problem. "Lily?" He was tentative.

"Mm?" I didn't want to speak in case my voice made my hurt prominent for him.

"Something's wrong." It was a statement. He looked deep in thought as he thought back on the conversation we were having. Something suddenly clicked and it made him turn a shade darker in the cheeks. "Sorry about… I mean that I didn't… I love you to." I said after his struggle for words.

I looked up, my vision partially blurred from the tears that didn't spill but still didn't go away that easily. I smiled at the goofy grin spread across his face.

I finally looked down at the essays that had been my distraction. "Seeing as I'm not getting anywhere farther on these tonight," I sighed as I put the essays in books and closed the books. I cleaned up my small workspace and collapsed upon the sofa in front of the roaring fire.

"Oh!" James suddenly remembered something as he made his way toward me. "Prefect meeting Thursday afternoon." He sat down next to me.

"Let's hope this one goes better than the last one." I muttered.

"I really hope so. Spending another night in a hospital really isn't appealing this week." James said.

"You don't have to stay, you know." I told him.

"And yet, something entices me to. The power you have over me is overwhelming." I smiled a crooked smile and I flushed a shade of pink.

I looked up at him and then realized how close he was in proximity to me. I don't remember him being that close a minute ago. Am I imagining things? And then he was just centimeters away from my face. I must have looked silly to him because he chuckled lightly before he pressed his lips to mine.

And in that instant I realized I didn't care how close he was. If he wanted to be this close to me, that was absolutely fine!

His lips were gentle and made up for mine when I pressed back with much more force than he imagined I would. I swear I could feel the smirk on his face by the urgency I was putting into this single kiss.

And then, far too soon if you ask me, he pulled away smiling. I realized how out of breath I was. I was slightly lightheaded too.

"Good night, Lily." James whispered to me before heading to his room.

_That, _I thought, _was something I would definitely have to try again…_

**So, I don't believe the alerts went out for the last chapter, something I'm not very happy about. If they don't go out for this chapter I'm going to contact the fan fiction people and let them handle it. **

**So, because of this alert (or lack thereof) crisis, I got 1 review last chapter. If you didn't review the last chapter, even though you read it, please review this chapter!**

**So, because there seemed to be a lot of Twilight fans (or enough), Team Edward or Jacob? Sorry if you aren't a Twilight fan, I'll ask something else next time. And for the record, Team Edward all the way! **


	17. Plans by Sirius Always Fail

**Chapter 17**

**Sorry about the mishaps with the point of view last chapter. I did a truly awful job with that! Anyhow, lets see if I can do better!**

I awoke the next morning. My mind was in a haze. Suddenly the memories from the night before flooded my head. The only reason I knew it wasn't-couldn't have been-a dream was the fact that it was far too detailed for a dream.

There was no way I could have imagined the feeling in the very pit of his stomach. My imagination wasn't strong enough to describe the way his lips felt on mine. It was all far too amazing for anyone to imagine.

I got out of bed and dressed quickly. I was actually excited to get out of my bedroom; tat was a first time since before the Hogsmead trip. I pushed that thought for my head. Eve though it was over, I didn't want to remember that day, nor the days following it.

I decided to get the thought out of my head by thinking about the night before. That did the trick; the thought of Hogsmead was pushed from my mind immediately. I skipped out of the door to my bedroom and shut the door behind me before I was knocked to the ground.

"Oh god! I'm sorry, I didn't realize…" I looked up with wide eyes to see James stammering for words, standing above me. I felt the smile spread across my face as I got up from my sitting position on the floor.

"James." I interrupted. My voice didn't faze him, he just continued stuttering and apologizing. I stood up. "James!" I yelled inches from his face. He stopped babbling and looked at me. My smile must've given me away but I still said, "It's fine. See" I held out my arms flipping them over before his eyes. "No harm done."

He seemed to be examining me for a moment before he realized I was right. "Okay." He said somewhat reluctantly.

"Breakfast, ready to go?" I asked suddenly after realizing I was incredibly hungry. I could feel the goofy grin on my face; maybe that was because his goofy grin was almost certainly mirroring mine identically. Even though I knew it was there, I couldn't get the grin to leave my face.

"Okay, to breakfast then." He said smiling. We walked down to the Great Hall together, talking and smiling like idiots. We walked into the hall and sat down with our friends.

"Aw! You kissed! That's soo cute! And oh my gosh it's about time! I thought you two would _never_ get to this point…" Shay babbled on without my recognition that she was talking.

"It's about time Jamsie gets some action!" Sirius exclaimed, smacking James on the shoulder. James glared at Sirius, but that didn't last long because the goofy-looking grin was back on his face when his eyes met mine. I felt my own silly grin mimicking his and Sirius rolled his eyes at us.

"You look mentally retarded." Sirius told James. James didn't appear to care.

"You look like Snivellus." He retorted without looking away from me.

Sirius gasped and looked angry when James showed no interest. "I'm offended!" He exclaimed. "Come on Moony! Let's go up to the common room away from these… mean people!"

"Sirius, I'm not done eating…" But Sirius grabbed Remus by the shoulder and dragged him away.

"Sometimes I have to wonder if Sirius is gay… the way he reacts to some things." Shay said rolling her eyes.

James looked intrigued, as was I. "You know, I often wonder the same thing! Wouldn't he make a good gay?"

"Yes! Well, except for the fact I'd be extremely unhappy and boyfriend less." Shay added.

"Who would Sirius shag on a weekly basis if he were gay though?" Peter asked. We all laughed lightly.

"I'm sure Sirius would find someone." James said.

"He is the almighty and sexy Sirius Black, after all." Alice added in. We continued the conversation about possible partners for Sirius to date if he were gay.

We got up to walk to our classes; Sonya went one way while the rest of us went the other. We were just entering a very crowded corridor when we head a shout. "Remus!" It was a female voice, but whose I didn't know.

We inched our way forward to the front of the now dense crowd. I gasped in shock. Some girl, a Hufflepuff by the looks of her robes, was snogging Remus. Remus didn't look to be participating in the kiss so much as trying to get away from the freak girl. Getting away from the girl looked difficult though, considering she had her arms wrapped around his neck with her hands in his hair attempting to push their heads further together. Meanwhile she had her legs wrapped around his waist. It looked near impossible to escape from.

Finally, from obvious need of air, the girl detached herself from a very stunned looking Remus.

Remus looked at the girl for a solid minute before asking, "Who the bloody hell are you?" The girl giggled.

"My name's Dulciana, but my friends call me Wanda." Remus looked even more dumbfounded by her response. _Who in their right mind would name their child Dulciana?_ He wondered to himself.

"Why'd you… what were you… ugh!" Remus turned and stalked off without another word, pushing easily through the crowd.

"That was weird." James muttered.

"Just a bit." Alice added in a soft tone that inclined that she was still in shock from the latest show.

"We better tell Sonya soon. Think of what she'll think if she overhears the bunch of Hufflepuffs talking about it." Shay said.

I groaned. "I really don't think that she and Remus are a good match. Not only is fate so obviously against them, she's too…" I couldn't think of a word.

"She's not lenient enough for him. Remus is very uptight to you guys, but compared to Sonya he's like a rowdy guy riding a motorcycle." Alice used a strange analogy.

"Remus on a motorcycle?" Sirius asked as he showed up beside me. "That would be quite a sight. Is there leather jackets involved?" He asked casually. I rolled my eyes.

"We're going to be late for class, we'll have to wait til next classes to tell Sonya." Alice said, completely ignoring Sirius. "Oh, and Shay? You were soo right. He'd definitely make a good gay." She pointed her thumb at Sirius whose eyes widened.

"Me? No! Remus should be gay if anyone! But me? I can't believe you!" He said.

"Hm, Remus gay… That's a possibility also. Maybe we found Sirius his perfect match." James started as we walked to class.

"Remus and Sirius? You're kidding, right? They're way too different!" Shay exclaimed.

"Well, they kind of… complete each other." James justified his belief.

"Will you stop talking about me being gay? I'm not! Have you not seen me? And Shay, how could you even suggest such a thing?" He quite suddenly shoved Shay up against the corridor wall and began to snog her senseless.

Shay broke free of his grasp after a moment and gasped out, "Yeah, I don't think Sirius is gay." We all laughed as he slid his arm around Shay's waist and walked away from us. Away from the direction we were supposed to take all together to get to our next class.

James rolled his eyes. "Leave it to Sirius to skip class to snog a girl to prove to his friends that he isn't gay…" We laughed and heading in the opposite direction of Sirius and Shay to our next class.

The class droned on for what seemed like hours before we were set free to roam the halls once more and head to our next class where we'd tell Sonya what happened. Unfortunately, Sonya was not in the classroom and did not show up at all for any of her morning classes.

"Oh god! She must've found out by someone else!" Shay groaned. Shay and Sirius had joined us for the second class and hadn't left for another snog session since.

"That can't be good." James muttered. Remus was baffled by our conversation. He didn't seem to know what exactly we were talking about.

Before we could say anything else, someone stormed up to our end of the table. Sonya was standing before us, well, Remus, and she looked livid. Remus turned his head to look at her, and she slapped him across the face. I flinched as I watched Remus as looks of confusion, anger, and a series of other emotions crossed upon his face.

Before Remus had a chance to react, Sonya huffed off in the direction in which she came from and moved out the door.

"What was that about?" Remus asked slowly. I could see the anger upon his confusion.

"We suspect someone, who wasn't any of us, told her about your snog earlier." I said in a very monotone voice to try to declare that I wasn't taking sides in this battle.

Remus was stunned for a moment. "But I didn't want that freak to throw herself on me! It wasn't _my_ bloody choice! And who the hell is she to think that I'm controlled by her?" Remus roared.

"Woah! Remmy, you swore!" Sirius exclaimed with awe. "That barely ever happens!"

Remus glared at Sirius and said furiously. "I'm done eating. See you guys in the dorms in a while." He got up and stomped out of the Great Hall.

"Well, now we have two angry friends. Can't life ever be normal?" Shay exclaimed.

"It's like a soap opera." Alice commented.

"It's life." James said dismally.

"I thought Remus liked Sonya, no?" Sirius asked. I knew what the answer would be, though I wish it were different. I was glad that someone had voiced the question still.

"Remus has been… annoyed with her for a while now. Couldn't you tell?" Peter asked. Sirius gawked at him. "Oh don't give me that look! You know I'm not that much a moron!" Peter exclaimed at seeing the look on Sirius' face.

"Wow, an observant Pete. That could be handy to remember." Sirius said and James nodded.

I glared at the both of them momentarily. "Pete, when did Remus start feeling the… aversion toward Sonya, do you know?" I asked, evidently intrigued.

"Er," he pondered this for a moment. "Actually, it was about the same time that you were upset with her. It was like we were missing something though, because we had no clue why he was acting the way he was."

Something in my head suddenly clicked into place, and I thought I saw a look of comprehension cross Alice's face. I looked at the two girls, ignoring the boys' questioning looks. "You think he overheard our Xeno argument?" I asked in a hushed tone.

They both looked in thought before Alice answered. "That would be the most logical thinking."

"But would he really get that upset about it?" Shay asked. "She was going to use Xeno to get to Remus, so shouldn't Remus be flattered?"

"No. That would flatter both Sirius and James, but Remus is different from them. He would've thought of it like Alice, it was rude and insensitive." I said thoughtfully.

"You're right." Alice agreed.

"So, Remus hates Sonya. But Sonya's in love with Remus. I thought we left this kind of drama with the middle school years!" Shay exclaimed, clearly exasperated.

I smiled gently at her. "I guess drama never leaves when there's love involved." I said quietly.

"True that!" Shay cried out and Alice nodded in agreement. There was a pause in which the boys looked extremely baffled.

"Are you going to bother explaining this to us?" Sirius asked in an irritated voice.

"I guess we should tell them." Alice said. She continued with her reasoning after seeing our shocked expressions. "If we don't, they can't help us. We have no clue where to go, and they do come up with good plans fairly often. It would be in our best interest to tell them." We nodded in agreement after a moment.

It took no less than ten minutes to explain to them the story of before Hogsmead with Xenophilius Lovegood. Sirius seemed a bit confused, but we dragged him away to the first empty classroom we could find to start devising a plan to help our friends.

An hour later and we still had nothing but a few of the stupidest plans ever imagined. Needless to say, Sirius devised all these.

Plan 1:

"We have Remus scream at her that he isn't interested!" Sirius cried out very bluntly.

"No!" All three of us girls said at the same time. "We want them to get along without hurting anyone's feelings." I explained forcefully.

"Hmph. It was a good plan too." Sirius muttered.

"Sirius, your plan sucked." James said.

"Well aren't we one to talk, Mr. 'hasn't thought of a thing yet'!" Sirius yelled.

"Well it's hard to talk with you yelling out every stupid thing you would do in this situation!" James bellowed. Both men were on their feet now. I grasped James' hand and attempted to pull him down. He was much stronger than me though.

"Calm down, calm down! We aren't getting anywhere with you two fighting!" Shay interjected. Both boys glared at each other and grunted, folding their arms over their chests in unison and sitting back down.

Plan 2:

"We get Remus a girlfriend and have them snog in the Gryffindor common room. Sonya will get the point and leave Remus alone!" Sirius exclaimed not two minutes after the first plan was rejected.

"No, Sirius. That would hurt Sonya." Alice told him in a tone that clearly implied she wasn't listening to anymore of Sirius' ideas.

Plan 3:

"How about…" Sirius began.

"We get all of Sirius' ex girl friends to hunt him down." James finished before Sirius could get out his idea.

"I'm in!" Alice exclaimed. I nodded with Peter and, surprisingly, Shay nodded as well.

"Hey! You're my girlfriend! You're supposed to be on my side!" Sirius yelled.

Shay looked at him. "I don't know. The thought is very tempting right now to just kill you myself."

He glared at her. "You wouldn't really kill me though… would you?" Ugh! He unleashes the puppy dog eyes. I swear he could pass for a dog with eyes like that!

Shay sighed. "No, I wouldn't. But you really need to shut up about your plans. They're all awful." She told him.

"Why don't we just try to get Sonya to go out with someone else?" Alice asked.

I sighed, ready to turn down yet another plan. Wait, that could work… "Yeah. If we get Sonya interested in someone else, she'll leave Remus alone and Remus will have no reason to be angry with her." I said.

"But if she's that infatuated with Remus, who do we get to go out with her?" James asked.

Shay looked at me with those pleading eyes. It took me a moment before I realized what she was thinking…

**Yay! Another chapter! I was going to try to make this one 3000 words, but I couldn't resist but stopping it here. Sorry. **

**I'm going to try to update tonight or tomorrow (I hope) with a somewhat shorter chapter. **

**10 reviews last chapter! Thank you: **_Your yellow flower, Happy Harry Fan, He'sAPirate, Id.Lie, Holy Cross Baby, LILYandJAMESareCUTE, MemberOfTheSugarCoatedCrew, Cookies94, Becca, and Harrison. _**Penguin girl, where are you? My own best friend doesn't review my story? I'm offended!**

**Review (you too Penguin chick)! Lollipop**


	18. Unhappy Success

Chapter 18 Chapter 18

Shay looked at me with those pleading eyes. It took me a moment before I realized what she was thinking…

"No!" I shouted. Everyone sitting there looked very curious. "No, no, no!" I repeated in a voice that was not as loud as the first.

"But Lily, you know it would work!" Shay pleaded.

"No!" I resisted, crossing my arms over my chest.

Sirius cut in before Shay had a chance to beg me more. "Would you care to fill us in on what's going on?" He asked.

"Well… Sonya always has fancied someone. And the person is… kinda recently not quite dating but might as well be…"

"Get on with it, Shay." Alice said in an irritated voice.

Shay sighed. "She still fancies James." James eyes widened with surprise, as he understood the conversation we had been having earlier.

"No." He said very simply. I smiled with relief.

"Well then we're screwed 'cause she's not just going to go for _anyone!_" Shay whined. "We have to make it someone special! And it doesn't have to last forever!"

"Wouldn't that still hurt her though?" Alice asked. I loved Alice so much.

"Not if she can dump James!" Shay said.

"But what if she goes back to Remus then?" Sirius asked.

"She won't. She always said that she'd never date a friend of someone she once dated because she would feel bad about it." Shay explained.

Alice snorted. "But she'll use Xeno Lovegood without a second thought to get the guy she wants. How very logical she is!" Alice's voice oozed with sarcasm.

There was a moment of silence where everyone looked very deep in thought. My eyes were discreetly watching James, but his face showed no emotion.

"James, I think you're gonna have to do this." Sirius said quietly.

"No." James told him in a deadly whisper with a glare. Sirius sighed.

Sirius sighed. "All you guys have to do is have a fake argument in front of a group of Slytherin girls, they're wicked gossip queens." Sirius explained briefly. "Lily, you just get mad at James about something, call him some names, break it off with him and leave. James meanwhile is angry and everything and he conveniently runs into Sonya.

"Sonya, after seeing him angry and just try to put on a somewhat hurt face, asks him what's wrong. James tells her what happened and how he just wishes he could find a girl who wouldn't be so uptight about things…"

"How are we going to get Sonya to throw herself at James though?" Alice asked.

Shay laughed a fake laugh. "The only reason she never did before was because she knew James was infatuated with Lily. Now that he shows no interest in her she'll be throwing herself at him in no time." Shay said.

"But Sonya doesn't seem like the type of girl who would…"

"Alice, Sonya threw herself at Xeno to trick him just weeks ago. She seems sweet and innocent but really can be quite heartless at times. It wouldn't surprise me if she threw herself right at James. And if she doesn't James'll have to make the first move." Shay said.

"I still don't like this plan." James said with his arms folded over his chest.

"Nor do I!" I added, glaring around the table.

Peter spoke up. "You guys can still be a couple and stuff, just not in public. For you two it shouldn't be that hard, you have the whole head dorm to yourselves and no one else can get in unless you want them to. Can we just try this plan? It's all we got." I sighed in defeat. When did Peter gain logic?

"Fine. I guess… Since there's nothing else we can do… I'll… I'll go along with the plan." Alice looked at me sympathetically. Shay half grinned in thanks. James looked quite stunned at me before he nodded, very reluctantly, to the others.

"Okay then, I guess you two should probably go start a fight soon then." Shay said.

"Wait!" I cried. "It has to be tonight? So soon?" I felt the horrified expression on my face. How could I have been so happy this morning and now so miserable?

"The sooner the better really." Shay said.

Alice hugged me. It's okay, the sooner this starts the sooner it can be over." I nodded against her shoulder we all stood up.

"We're going to go fine Sonya and send someone to tell James about where she is." Shay said. "The Slytherins shouldn't be hard to find, they're anywhere the gossip is. Just try to sound convincing." Shay added. She hugged me briefly before grabbing Sirius' hand to go find Sonya.

Alice followed behind them. "I'll send a patronus with her whereabouts in fifteen minutes. If that's enough time, of course." She added in a questioning tone. I nodded to her and she continued Shay and Sirius out the door with Peter at her heels.

I stood there like a zombie. More like someone who had recently been stunned, actually. I watched them leave, but couldn't seem to make sense of it all. Everything was moving to fast now.

The next thing I knew I was being spun around by my hand and James was kissing me again. This wasn't the same kind of kiss from the night before, this one was more urgent. Almost like he wasn't sure when the next time he would be able to do this. Though I knew we would probably be able to do this tonight if we truly wanted to, I kissed him back with the same urgency.

His hands cupped my face and when he finally pulled away I was nearly gasping for breath. "I guess we should go then." He said very reluctantly.

"What am I yelling at you for?" I asked.

He thought for a moment. "For stealing Shay's underwear while you girls were asleep last night. Then Shay can say that it did happen and you have reason to be angry with me."

I nodded in agreement, that did seem like something I would be very angry with him for. We walked down the halls and found a group of Slytherin girls, one of which was Sirius' cousin Bellatrix.

"If Sirius is right about Bellatrix this story will be around the school in no time. You ready?" He asked. I nodded, though I wasn't sure that I felt ready.

"Aw, come on Lils! It was a joke!" James said with that half grin on his face.

I glared one of my signature "if looks could kill" glares and his eyes widened in surprise. I think he may have been truly surprised by the look I was giving him, actually. "Stealing my best friends underwear is not a joke, Potter, it's just plain _rude!_" I told him, my voice growing louder with every word.

"It was funny! Everyone else thought so, just be a bit more laid back, Lils!" James made his tone lofty like he really didn't think that this was bad at all. I wondered if I was doing as well at this acting as he was.

"You're the most annoying prat I have ever met!" I screamed.

James suddenly seemed angry. We were attracting a crowd now, that was good. And the group of Slytherin girls were in the front of said crowd, that was very good. They looked genuinely intrigued by our argument.

"Well you're the most stuck up chick I've ever met!" James growled.

I glared at him. "Ugh! I can't believe I agreed to go out with a jerk like you!"

"I can't believe you're overreacting like this!"

"I am not overreacting, Potter! I… Just stay away from me!" I turned on my heel and stomped away. I pushed through the crowd, not very easily, I might add. Then I stomped off to the head dorms.

The crowd dispersed when I looked back over my shoulder and James was already gone to wait for Alice's patronus. I sighed. The argument was very hard for me and I was actually surprised I managed as well as I did. I felt weak now that the argument was over though; the adrenaline rush I had before was gone now.

I made it to the head's common room and sank onto the sofa, wondering where James was now. Had he already found Sonya? Was she throwing herself over him yet? Would she kiss him?

I wondered what I would do if she kissed him. Slap her. That was the first thing to come to my mind. But I had to stay in character, so I couldn't do that.

What if James did have to make the first move? Would he kiss her? No, he would never do that. Would he? The question that ran through my head were killing me. My brain came up with question after question and made the scenarios of what would hurt me most. They ate me from the inside out. They devoured me starting with my brain, moving to my heart and everything in between.

By the time James walked into the room it was dark. I hadn't moved, hadn't done anything. I looked up anxiously at him. He sighed with relief as he sat down on the sofa beside me, gathering me into a tight hug.

"I'm sorry," he repeated into my ear. My heart rate picked up considerably. What would he be sorry for? What did he do that he's sorry because of it?

"What happened?" I asked him urgently.

"Everything went perfectly, just like the plan was supposed to go. But I can never be happy with that because Shay was right. She threw herself right at me. After consoling me with words that would've done shit if this was a real situation she started kissing me. I couldn't just shove her away though; I would be making things worse if I did that. I slowed her down, but she's definitely under the impression I'm interested in her." James explained.

I thought about it. "So why are you sorry?" I whispered into his ear.

He sighed. "I was going to try to keep it as… no contact as possible. I don't know how you can do this. Just sit here knowing that I just snogged your best friend. I would be in frenzy if you ever kissed Sirius, even under these circumstances. I would be angry with him… with you. But you're not angry with me in the least. I thought that I would need to apologize." He finished.

I let the silence take us over for a minute. "I am angry, you know. But I would never be angry with you about this. It isn't your fault; you have to play your role. I'm angry with Sonya and how it took her less than ten minutes to throw herself at you, knowing that we just fought. If I wasn't trying to keep my role I'd slap her." James smiled against my hair as he pressed soft kisses into my hair.

"Lily you are amazing. And, by the way, I don't think you're stuck up in the least." I grinned against his chest.

"I have to wonder why I'm helping her now though." I admitted. "I know she's my friend and everything, but…" I sighed.

"If she were really your friend I don't think she would have thrown herself at me the way that she did." James said. I could feel tears begin to sting my eyes.

"I've known her since first year! She was always there and now…" I was sobbing against James' chest, getting his shirt wet with the tears spilling from my eyes. I was glad I had him here to hold me together this time.

"It's okay, Lils…" He whispered into my hair. "It'll all turn out fine."

I looked up at him through my blurred vision. "But will it really, James?" I asked.

He closed his eyes. "I don't know." The words made the tears come faster. At least I knew James wasn't going to lie to me and that I could trust him.

"Come on Lils, you need some sleep." James muttered. He lifted me up into his arms and carried me to my room. He set me down in my bed and kissed my head lightly.

"Don't go." My voice was hoarse. He closed his eyes and sighed. But when he looked at me he nodded lightly. He climbed onto of the covers and held me that way.

"Thank you." I whispered. I saw him smile half-heartedly.

"How could I say no to you?" He asked and I had to smile just a bit before drifting off into sleep in his arms.

**Two chapters in one day, and both over 2000 words. That's pretty amazing, f I do say so myself. I'm going to start the next chapter tonight I think, but I don't know if that one will be out as quick. Please review! Lollipop**


	19. The Angel is Always Right

Chapter 19 Chapter 19

I awoke the next morning to James' soft snoring. I smiled when I saw him, and then remembered all the drama from yesterday, and something clicked in my head that no one had thought of yesterday.

I shoved James back and forth until he woke up. "Mm… What?" He mumbled.

"James!" I said forcefully to wake him up. His eyes opened wider, but he still looked groggy.

"What is it, Lils?" He asked sleepily.

"Remus, he's going to know and he won't be happy about this!" I said urgently.

James' brow furrowed. "How's Remus going to find out? And it's not like I _slept _with you. I just… slept with you." James said very vaguely.

"No! Not this! What you're doing with Sonya! He was angry with Sonya 'cause she used Xeno, well aren't we doing the same thing to her?" I asked. He seemed to understand this time.

"Aw shit! I completely forgot about Remus! Come on, we need to go tell him about what we're doing and why and…" James was on his feet moving to the door, dragging me along behind him.

"James, I can't go with you." I said. He looked at me curiously and then understanding crossed his face. "I can't go anywhere outside these rooms with you." I whispered. The concept took on the surprise that it had lacked yesterday.

I can't sit with James at meals or during classes. I can't hang around with Sirius and them because I'm supposed to be mad at James, and his friends would ordinarily be involved in that if this were real. I can't always be around Shay or Sonya, because they'll want to be with their boyfriends. It was just going to be Alice and me with an occasional Shay, and this thought tore through me painfully.

"Lils…" James started. I shook my head to stop him.

"No, this has to be done. Just go tell Remus what's going on, chances are Sirius has already. I guess I'll see you at breakfast." I told him before turning and going to get dressed. He didn't leave just yet, but when I closed the door to my room I thought I heard the portrait open.

When I was in the safe confines of my bedroom I let the few tears that were brought about by the sudden realizations flow down my face freely. I decided that I wasn't going to let James see me cry like I did last night anymore. It wasn't right that he should feel bad about my own problems.

I got dressed quickly and might as well have jogged to the Great Hall. Alice was sitting with Shay and Sonya. She looked bored out of her mind. Then I saw Sonya's mouth moving at a mile a minute. I took a deep breath. This was going to be the hard part.

I walked over casually and plopped down next to Alice and across from Sonya. "Oh Lily you just have to hear about this!" I forgot I wasn't supposed to know anything about James and her yet. I tried my best to looked intrigued and confused. She bought my expression.

"Okay, so I was just walking along and about to go up the stairs to the seventh floor corridor when I saw James just sitting there looking really sad! So I walked over and asked him what was wrong and he babbled about something that went wrong between you two and then I kissed him to try to make him feel better and it must've worked 'cause now we're going out!" She babbled on about how great their kiss was and every insignificant detail that tore me open inside.

I wasn't happy in the least. I couldn't believe how shallow she had been! She didn't even listen to what James had to say! And why was she telling me this? Shouldn't she be trying to keep it away from me? Wouldn't that be what a real friend would do? Who the hell did she turn into?

"And oh my gosh there is just _soo_" I hated when people dragged out there words. I mean, just spit it out already. "Much chemistry! And I know he can feel it too because the way he kissed me… there is absolutely no way to describe that! And I mean, I thought maybe I had pushed things a little too far by kissing him, but he didn't pull away or anything!"

I had to try very hard to be happy for Sonya. It wasn't hard when someone you called your friend just days before is very clearly rubbing something in you face until it actually _hurts_ you. Just then, the Marauders walked in.

"I need to go talk to Remus." I lied. I guess I did have reason to talk to Remus, but mostly I just needed an excuse to get away from this discussion.

"Okay, I'll see you later, Lily!" Sonya said excitedly. I knew she was just itching to rub it in further, I could tell from the look on her face.

I walked up to the boys. James ignored me, good playing of his role. Sirius looked up and glared at me. "What'd you want, Evans?" He checked to see if Sonya was looking. When she wasn't he smiled at me and mouthed 'hi Lily-flower' excitedly. I had to fight not to laugh.

"Can I have a word, Remus?" I asked politely.

"We told him." James muttered without looking up from his meal.

"Oh, I know. I mean, I figured that, but Remus is the only one of you who would be okay with talking with me right now. Please don't make me go back to that!" I pleaded glancing briefly at Sonya. "It's pure torture! She's rubbing it all in my face I can't take it anymore!" James looked up at me and looked very, very angry.

"This is off, I don't want you to be hurt just to get a girl off Remus' tail!" James growled glaring at Sonya. Luckily she wasn't looking.

"No! We started this and we're going to finish it." I said with finality. "Now ignore me, Potter!" I ordered. I thought I saw a grin flash on his face before he turned away. "But please Remus, bring some toast, your whole plate if you want. Just don't make me go back there!"

"Okay, see you guys in class." He said standing up with a few pieces of toast in his hand. We walked from the hall together in silence.

"Sorry about this… about everything really. Taking you from your breakfast wasn't my intention at all, I just…" I trailed off.

"Is she really being that awful?" He asked quietly as we made our way onto the Hogwarts grounds and headed in the direction of the lake.

"Yes. I swear she's a completely different person these days. You know everything about what we did yesterday, right?" I asked him.

"Yeah, James talked about how you and him fought and she listened, consoled him and then started snogging him." Remus recalled the tale James had told me.

"Yeah, that what James thought too. She never listened to James talk; she didn't care. She just said some random stuff to make him feel better and kissed him. Now she's over there telling us how there was so much chemistry between them and explaining the kiss from her point of view in high detail. It's tearing me apart." I admitted, finally getting to tell someone everything I was feeling.

I knew I could never tell James this because he would get far too angry and call the whole thing off like he almost did earlier. I couldn't tell Alice and Shay because Sonya was always with them. And I was supposed to be angry with Sirius for helping James with the fake prank. Remus was the only one I could talk to now, and I was glad he didn't appear to be angry with us.

"Are you really not angry with us?" I had to ask him this. He sighed deeply.

"I'm not happy with what you're doing, but I can't be mad at you after hearing what she's doing." Remus explained. I nodded.

"I wasn't very big on this plan. I'm not sure how it's going to work out in the end, but it was the only thing we could think of." I explained.

He looked at me seriously. "You could have done nothing and let me handle it on my own. I was just going to talk to her myself and explain to her how I felt in comparison to how she's acting."

I blinked. "Oh my god… We're so stupid! Why didn't we think of letting the smart one settle it one his own?" I cried, collapsing into the grass in front of the lake.

I heard Remus chuckle and he sat down beside me. "Oh well, this will all work itself out I'm sure." He said patting me on the shoulder.

There was a silence. "Thanks Remus." I said quietly. He smiled lightly.

"I'm always here for our favorite flower." He said smiling. I smiled back and watched as he leaned back on the grass.

"We should probably get to class." I said after a long but comfortable silence between the two of us.

Remus looked at me with a Marauder style grin on his face. "I don't know, I'm very comfortable here. And Sirius has been saying I spend too much time studying lately. I think I'm going to skip today." I must've looked a little shocked because he laughed. "I'm only skipping the first class, you can go to it if you want."

"No," I said. "I just never saw you skipping class to lay in the sun."

"Lay in the sun with a girl. It makes a difference, Lily." I laughed at him.

"Right, lay in the sun with a girl." There was more comfortable silence. I laid down beside him and looked up at the sky.

There were no clouds today. The sky was merely a flat expanse of endless blue. As far as you could see the sky was various shades of blue. It looked quite amazing to me, how it never seemed to end amazed me in a way that brought my mind far from the grounds of Hogwarts and my recent troubles. I was floating, no problems, nothing holding me down, just floating…

"Lily?" I was brought violently back to Earth.

"Mm?" I asked, still looking up at the blue sky.

"What happened to Sonya?" He asked, his voice far away.

I didn't know what to say. "I don't really know. This year's been really hard. What with Yvonne being… with Yvonne and now Sonya. I don't know what's happening." I told him. I thought my voice sounded just as far away as his did.

"It has been a tough year so far, hasn't it been? And to think we've only been through a month and a half… It feels like the year should be ending with everything that's happened already." Remus said.

"Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. It feels like the year should be over next week, not Halloween." I closed my eyes thinking about all that has happened this year. First Yvonne, then my mum, now Sonya. How many more people was I going to have to lose? Who would be next; Remus, my dad, James… I pushed the thought from my head immediately. I was not going to be losing anyone else this year, I told myself firmly.

* * *

A week had passed since the day Remus and I skipped class. It was the evening before Halloween and I was sitting with Shay, Alice, and Sirius at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall. Sirius' story was that he didn't like the way Sonya swooned over James so he could tolerate me now, but was mostly here for Shay. And because he couldn't tolerate Sonya swooning over James.

Nobody was really pleased with Sonya. Actually, she really annoyed all of us. Shay, Sirius, Peter, and Remus all took turns sitting with her and James because they couldn't take being with her at every meal. Alice always stood by me, something Shay would do also if she were not dating Sirius.

Remus was talking to Peter, trying to avoid the sight of Sonya and James. James looked uncomfortable to me, but everyone else thought he looked really happy. He was playing his part in this really well; I just didn't know how much more I could take.

Sonya was currently sitting next to James, though she was so close it was hard to tell if she was sitting on his lap or not. James was holding his fork with one hand and had the other wrapped around her waist. I wondered how long this was going to go on. It had only been a week, and I was already on he verge of breaking down every time I saw Sonya and James like this.

James was good though. He made sure not to kiss her in front of me, though he did kiss her. He would always tell me what he did when he got in after dinner each night, as to not leave my mind wandering, something I was eternally grateful for. He kissed me nearly every night now. I think it made his mind more at ease with the fact that he snogged someone else everyday.

But I still wondered, quite frequently, if he was really trying to get her to end it. The one part of my mind says yes, of course he is! He loves you Lily! But the other part says that he's just a Marauder, just in it for the girls and he'll soon break it off with the both of you! I guess it's like asking those little angels and devils that sit on your shoulders in cartoons, or at least, that's the way if feels to me. Like I asked the same question and the angel gives me and answer, the one I really hope is true; and then the devil says the opposite and gets me thinking things that my friends always tell me are "completely ridiculous". I was glad they seemed so sure about that.

I happened to glance over at James and Sonya only to see Sonya glance briefly over at me before turning and kissing James right there in the middle of the Gryffindor table. I felt myself go still completely. My eyes were wide in surprise and shock that she would actually _do_ that to me. I gaped at them for a moment.

James broke off the kiss choking on the food he had been chewing. Sonya looked over and had a grin of accomplishment on her face.

I was still not moving when I felt Alice helping me up by taking me by the arm. Shay and Sirius were walking away in the direction of James and Sonya and Alice was taking me towards the door. The last thing I heard before the door shut behind us was Sirius bellowing at; whom I was assuming was Sonya.

Alice took me to the head's dorms and I said the password. She brought me in and sat us both down on the couch before wrapping her arms around my stiff form.

"I'm so sorry, Lily! I should've known she was planning something awful! She kept looking over until you looked back and then…" Alice groaned in frustration. "I could've prevented this whole thing from happening if I would have just thought into the situation a little bit more!"

"It's okay, Alice. It's not your fault." I muttered.

She was silent for a moment. "Maybe this will be for the better." She said finally.

I looked at her with confusion etched into the lines of my face. "Well, with Shay and Sirius that angry, maybe Remus and Peter will get involved, and James too maybe and this will all be over tonight." She explained to me.

"Oh Alice I hope so!" I said. "I'm not sure how much more I can take! What happened to her? She was never this… shallow before."

"People change. Sometimes for the better, often for the worse." Alice said gently, hugging me again. I nodded in understanding against her shoulder.

She released me shortly after and we both sat on the sofa. My knees were curled to my chest as I ran through possible scenarios of what might have happened in my mind.

What seemed like hours but was really only about twenty minutes later the portrait opened. Alice and I looked up hopefully as James entered the room with Sirius, Peter, Remus, and Shay following him in.

He walked over to me and lifted me up pressing his lips to mine forcefully but in such a way that was reassuring. I could feel the moisture in my eyes pool and spill over. He broke away suddenly.

"What's wrong? It's over now." He said. The concern was in his voice though I couldn't see clearly through my wet eyes. I hugged him around his middle and sobbed. I let all the thoughts the devil had put into my head out in my tears. I had held this in for a very torturous week, I think I deserved just a moment to let the walls I had struggled to keep standing fall.

"Nothing's wrong." I answered him shakily.

I could feel his brow furrow in confusion as he held me, running his hand through my hair and down my back. He didn't ask any further about my emotional breakdown, just sat on the sofa, pulling me down onto his lap. I could hear everyone else moving toward the door.

I looked up and wiped my eyes hurriedly. Sitting up urgently I said. "Don't go." They turned and smiled. Sirius was the first to walk over and plop down beside where James and I sat. Shay and Alice followed him, Shay taking the seat beside him and Alice taking an armchair. Remus turned two coffee mugs into armchairs for himself and Peter and they too sat down.

Alice voiced the question I had before I could. "So what exactly happened down there?" James looked at me cautiously.

"It's fine. I want to know." I told him before kissing him lightly on his lips.

"It was an epic battle!" Sirius began. Shay laughed and rolled her eyes.

"It went more like this actually," Shay began. "Alice was leaving with you and Sirius was heading for Sonya before I realized what he was doing. I got up and ran toward him, very angry with Sonya, but I focused on getting Sirius to not do anything drastic.

"Well Sirius stops right in front of her and glares at her before screaming 'what was that for' with a few… creative words added in there if you know what I mean." I smiled and nodded. I could see Sirius swearing in front of a table full of teachers at the top of his lungs.

"Anyway, I run up to him and when I get there _she's_ got that damned 'what did I do' look on her face. I lost it there and started screaming at her myself. She wasn't too pleased with…"

"Aren't you going to tell them about the creative words _you_ used?" Sirius cut in with a smirk on his face. Shay blushed a shade of scarlet.

"Yeah, well… I was angry and said a few things that I think surprised Dumbledore when the words left my mouth. So now she's glaring at us and says 'I didn't _do_ anything', that's when Peter, Remus and James got angry. Well, actually James had been angry, but his choking fit had prevented him from doing anything drastic yet.

"So now we have me and Sirius who are beyond angry; Remus, Peter, and James who are getting more pissed off by the minute; and about five teachers walking toward us at full speed." Shay was smiling as though this was a memory from long ago that she was recalling for the first time in a decade.

"Well Remus and Peter are on their feet and I'm sure James would have been too if _she_ hadn't been holding him where he was. And now we know we only have about thirty seconds before the teachers get here and Sirius punches her hard and gives her a bloody nose while Remus is hollering at her about how she 'knows very well what she did' and Peter pounces and takes her to the floor!" Everyone was smiling and laughing as the either envisioned or re-envisioned the scene in their heads.

"So the teachers show up and break it up, give all of us a month of detention…"

"Though I swear McGonagall _and_ Dumbledore were both trying not to laugh at the sight of Peter attacking Sonya whose screaming at the top of her lungs!" Sirius cut in.

"And some unlucky teacher had to take Sonya to the Hospital Wing. She only had minor injuries; I think the most serious was either the bloody nose or the cut on her arm that Peter's nail made when he pounced. But the teacher looked like they were dreading it."

"Do you blame them? She was wailing and pretending she was going to faint saying 'oh gosh! James… help me'!" Sirius said in a very high-pitched impersonation of Sonya's voice. I laughed.

"That was when James looked at her like she was crazy and said… what was it that you said? I wouldn't want to get the quote wrong now," Shay said looking to James and smiling a mischievous grin.

"Oh, it was something like 'why the hell would I help you'." James said.

"Actually it was a word longer than that." Shay reminded him.

James turned a pale pink. "That's… insignificant." He muttered. We all laughed.

I looked up at James. "I'm glad you called her a bitch. You said exactly what I would have had it been a different situation." I grinned at him and he smiled his lopsided grin at me.

"Are you going to kiss _again_?" Sirius asked like a five year old would.

"Well, I wasn't planning on it, but now that you mention it…"

"No!" Sirius let the word ring out extra long. James and I laughed along with everyone else as Sirius covered his eyes with his hands and attempted to block us out by say variations of the word 'la'.

"You're supposed to cover your ears and shut your eyes, Sirius." I told him through the laughter.

"Oh, right!" He said and did just that. I rolled my eyes at his naïve-ness. Life was looking up again, but I couldn't help but wonder what would bring it crashing back down next time…

**Nearly three updates in a day! Well, I guess this is the next day, but three updates in 24 hours! Wahoo! : **

**This chapter was about 3800 words. I hope it wasn't boring for you. I promised I would make a long chapter when one reader, I believe it was **_Becca _**said the chapters needed to be longer. Tell me if I should go back to the other length or if you preferred this please!**

**Tell me what you thought of the fight that broke out please! I am pleased with how that turned out! **

**Well, I'm off to bed now! Good night and happy reading! I'm not sure when I'll update next now. **

**Oh, and has anyone read the story **_**Lily's List**_**? Well, it was just completed at 41 chapters and it is really great so if you haven't checked it out I suggest it to you! Tootles! Lollipop**


	20. Halloween Pranks

**A/N: I'm going to be speeding this story up a bit. Chapter 20, I just think that we should be a bit farther along than nearly November, so expect a bit more skipping of days. I'm thinking maybe 4-5 chapters per month. Does that sound good? I hope so!**

**Chapter 20**

I woke up the next morning on the sofa in James' arms. I woke up to his soft snores, but there was more than that. I opened my eyes slowly and saw all of my friends sprawled around the room.

Remus was sitting on another sofa we must have conjured up in the middle of the night with his head rested on the back of the sofa, his mouth hanging open. Alice was laying on the other half, curled into a ball with her head in Remus' lap.

Sirius and Shay were twisted together in such a way that you couldn't tell that they were two separate people at first. Their heads were pointed in opposite directions, Sirius' foot appeared to be wedged into Shay's stomach, something that seemed quite uncomfortable to me. But I guess Shay's foot squashed into Sirius' cheek made up for that. Sirius was snoring around Shay's foot and Shay's mouth was wide open, breathing heavily.

Peter was on the floor, his arms and legs each pointing in different directions. He was, much to my surprise, not snoring at all. Actually, I felt the urge to kick him just to make sure he wasn't dead.

I couldn't help but giggle at the scene laid out before my eyes. "Mmm…" James mumbled. His eyes opened halfway and widened when he saw me. He immediately looked down at our bodies and looked back up with a sleepy smile. "Morning." He murmured.

I smiled at him. "Morning. Look at those two," I indicated to Shay and Sirius. James chuckled lightly and rolled his eyes at our friends. Remus' eyes opened at the sound. He must be a light sleeper.

His eyes widened as he saw Alice. "Oh." He said. He voice was a bit of a croak. I giggled at the expression on his face. "Should I… Wake her?" He asked me.

I shrugged. "If you're feeling uncomfortable. She's a pretty heavy sleeper though." I warned him. He shook her lightly and I couldn't help but laugh. "You're never going to wake her that way. Here," I got to my feet and walked over to them. I grasped Alice's shoulders and flung her to the floor in one motion.

She screamed. When she looked at her surroundings, she muttered obviously, "I'm laying on the floor." I turned to walk away with a smile on my face but something latched on my ankle and I flopped to the floor beside Alice.

"Hey!" I yelled at Alice's hand grasping my ankle. Shay was awake looking at us with a confused expression while James and Remus laughed.

Shay seemed to realize her uncomfortable position and kicked Sirius nonchalantly. Sirius groaned and opened his eyes. "Ow! You kicked me!" Sirius said through closed eyes. Shay smiled and pulled herself free from him but he grabbed her waist when she tried to stand and brought her back down on top of him. "No." He grinned mischievously.

"Not here." She said simply, but he kissed her anyway and she didn't object in the slightest.

"And you complained about _us_ snogging in front of you…" James muttered. Shay broke away from Sirius reluctantly and Sirius smirked at James. Meanwhile I was still fighting to get away from Alice.

"Let go!" I cried.

"It's your fault! You flung me on the ground!"

"Because Remus was too polite to do it himself!"

She looked confused. "What? Remus… and… what?"

"You fell asleep on Remus, he wasn't comfortable so he tried to gently shake you awake."

She seemed shocked for a moment. "I… but… and… oh. Sorry Remus." She muttered as she released my foot. I scrambled back to the couch James was still sitting on and sat beside him.

Shay was all smiles immediately and nearly jumped to her feet. "Breakfast! Now!" She called. We all groaned in unison.

"Come on!" She shrieked. She pulled me to my feet before going over and doing the same to a very reluctant Alice and dragging us out the door without the boys.

"What about them?" I asked, indicating toward where the boys still sat.

"I only have two hands!" Shay told me.

When we entered the Great Hall I remembered that it was Halloween. The decorations were as lovely as every year. Pumpkins hovered over the tables with candles in them rather than the usual floating candles. There were enchanted bats flying around the room as well.

I sat down beside James at the Gryffindor table for the first time in a week. He wrapped his arm around my waist instinctively. There were murmurs going around the hall suddenly like some big news story just broke out.

I laughed and rolled my eyes at the whispering people around the Great Hall. Did they have nothing to talk about but James Potter and me? Was this the most important thing in the entire wizarding world?

James looked down at me curiously. I pointed to a gaggle of girls down the table staring at us with wide eyes whispering quickly to each other.

"Oh. I didn't realize this" he tightened his arm around my waist. "Would have such a shocking response." Suddenly a smile lit up his face.

"What?" I asked innocently. And then he was leaning towards me and his lips were on mine. Those damned butterflies were back in my stomach and I didn't respond for more than half of the kiss.

I thought I heard someone-probably Sirius- wolf whistling. James pulled back and grinned wider when he looked around to see many gaping faces. I even giggled at the looks some of the people were giving us.

"Well that's interesting…" Remus said disgustedly when he looked around the Great Hall with the Daily Prophet laid out before him.

"What?" I asked.

"Everyone's acting like you two snogging is the most shocking thing on the planet, and there were three killings last night and two disappearances. You have to love how nobody cares about the important things…" Remus scowled.

"Three?" Shay asked, her eyes bulging.

"Who?" Alice asked before I could.

"Don't know them… Meadows… Dorcas, twenty-one, a three-year-old daughter, Claire and a seven-month son, Sean. The father was away for a few days and when he got back they were all dead. The ministry thinks you-know-who is behind it."

I couldn't help but feel bad for the family. They were all so young. Twenty-one is even relatively young. And the children! Seven months…

"Who disappeared?" James asked. He was suddenly more serious; I couldn't blame him.

"Gwendolyn Nestor and Jayne Arval… I've never heard of Arval, but Nestor was a head of magical illnesses at St. Mungos. The Ministry thinks that you-know-who is trying to separate families. There are usually more disappearances than deaths, but the deaths are always families with one or two people excluded."

"It makes sense, though; to get rid of most of a family. If you leave one person alone their more venerable, then he can try to make them join him. If they don't he kills them." Peter said without looking up.

Remus blinked at him a few times. "You're… You're right. Well, it makes sense at least! And I'll bet the father of the Meadows kids will either go missing or be announced dead in a few weeks." Remus said sadly. James seemed to tighten his arm around my waist. I felt small tears prick at my eyes but I pushed them away.

How could someone be able to kill a child to get people to follow him? And who would follow someone like that? If my family were all killed would I join him? No. I knew the answer was true but I still shivered involuntarily at the thought.

"I'm done eating." I said as I stood up. James must have felt me shudder and stood up with me, keeping one arm around me.

"I'll come too."

"Where?" I asked. He shrugged as he pulled me along. We walked out of the hall and I glared at every shocked face I saw.

"How could they even think about us when people are dying!" I asked, infuriated by the thought. I felt the tears start to prick my eyes again.

"They're just…" James sighed. "I don't know, they aren't… They're all morons." I laughed weakly at his bluntness.

We walked outside and around the lake in a soft mist that fit Halloween perfectly. The more I thought about the news stories the more tears that came to my eyes. We were at the quidditch pitch and I was sobbing into James' shoulder. He led me into the locker room and sat down, pulling me to him and holding me there. I cried about the families that were being torn apart and the people being forced to follow _him_.

We were suddenly brought back to planet Earth when we heard a loud commotion outside the locker room on the field. I stood up to allow James up and we rushed to the pitch.

When we arrived at the pitch there was a very unusual sight awaiting us. The entire Slytherin quidditch team was lying in a bundle on the ground in a corner. I heard Sirius' voice echo around the pitch.

"And the Slytherins brooms don't appear to want to move forward! Extraordinary! Could this be a Halloween prank? It must be, but who is the mastermind behind this brilliant plan?" James chuckled and shook his head.

"I wish I would've been here for the brooms' take-off." James muttered to himself.

I was smiling slightly too. "James, how did they get out here? We were sitting in the changing room." I said.

"We sat in the girls' changing room. Slytherin didn't choose any girls for their team this year; even though half the girls who tried out are better at quidditch than the captain." James murmured darkly.

I nodded in understanding. "James! Do you see this? Who would have come up with such an ingenious plan, eh?" Sirius' voice boomed over the pitch.

"I don't know," James bellowed. With the echo from the pitch he was very loud. "I'm sure some fantastically brilliant guy. Though I don't remember doing it..." James added with a smirk.

"What? No way! This was the work of a genius-mastermind! And you would have never even thought of that!" Sirius screamed.

"Yeah, it must be some nerd who came up with this one; I'll have to ask Remus about it later. We know people like you don't have the kind of brain power to come up with this."

"Wh… but… no… and…" Sirius groaned. "You just have to ruin it for me!" He stomped out of the commentators box in quite the melodramatic fashion and James chuckled.

"Come on, let's go find that raging lunatic." I smiled and followed James out of the pitch. "Hey Sirius!" He called when he saw the boy.

"I'm not speaking to _you_!" He spat. "Hi Lily." He added.

James smiled. "Sirius, great prank back there."

"Flattery will get you no where." Sirius said without looking at James.

"Oh come on!" James begged smiling. "It was a great prank. And I have a small one for later if you want to talk to me again." Sirius whipped around in an instant.

"Hello James! Let's discuss… Run along now, Flower! There's business to be done here." Sirius said to me. I rolled my eyes at the two boys and walked back to the castle.

I walked to the Gryffindor common room, but Shay and Alice weren't there. Sonya glared at me when I walked in though. She stood up immediately and walked over to me, glaring all the way.

"I saw you with James today." She said enviously.

"Yeah, I'm just thankful that he took me back after the awful things I said to him. He's so extraordinary! And after what I said… Well, he must really love me." I said in a tone that I tried to make sound far too thankful and innocent.

She glared her daggers twice as hard at me. "Yeah, we'll see about that…" She mumbled. "Bye, Lily." She said my name spitefully and walked out of the room.

I smiled to myself and checked the girls' dormitory for Shay and Alice; they weren't there either. Next I checked the library, the kitchens, and anywhere else I imagined they could be.

I sighed in frustration. Where could they be? I decided to head back to the common room. I scanned the room briefly for someone I could talk to. I spotted Remus and Peter sitting nearby and headed over to them.

"Hey," I said smiling.

"Hi, Lily." Peter said looking up.

"Checkmate." Remus said casually. Peter looked back down at the chessboard. He groaned in frustration. "Six to none. And hello, Lily." He said turning to me and smiling as I sat down.

"Do you know where Alice and Shay are?" I asked the two boys.

Remus looked baffled. "Shay said that they were off to look for you about an hour ago."

"Yeah, right after she accused Remus of liking Alice!" Peter piped up.

"What?" I gasped.

"Yeah, apparently I'm in love with Alice now." Remus said shaking his head. "Don't know where she comes up with these things…" I laughed.

"She's a strange one. But they really went looking for me an hour ago? I've searched the school for them and I couldn't find them for the life of me!"

"We'll see them around I'm sure." Peter said. "Want to play chess, Lily?"

"Sure. What time's it?" I asked as Peter set up the chessboard.

"Three." Remus answered. "I shouldn't have skipped lunch." He added as his stomach growled furiously for food. I chuckled lightly at the sound.

* * *

There were still no signs of Alice or Shay when we headed to dinner two hours and eight won games later. James and Sirius were still missing, leaving Peter, Remus and I to eat alone.

"Lily Evans!" Shay screamed from the door. "We sat in your special common room all day for you and you never came!" She stomped her way over to us.

"Really? I sat in your common room all day as well!" I exclaimed through my mashed potatoes.

"Oh." Shay said, lost for words.

The girls sat down. "Where're James and Sirius?" Alice asked me.

"Planning some minor Halloween prank. Did you hear about the Slytherin's brooms?" I asked them.

"No." They both responded simultaneously.

"Oh well…" But just then James and Sirius burst through the doors of the Great Hall and the pumpkins over the tables suddenly exploded into a giant mess of pumpkin juice, seeds, and mush. The candles also went flying, and most of them were put out by the speed at which they soared through the air, but a few were not so lucky.

"Ahh!" A Ravenclaw girl screamed as her robes caught flame. Another screech came from the Slytherin table, and another two from Gryffindor.

"Potter! Black!" McGonagall bellowed across the room while the other teachers put the fire on the students and around the hall out. "What did you do?"

"I think that's pretty obvious, Minerva." Sirius said. Professor McGonagall looked ready to kill.

"Detention both of you!" She screamed in their faces and tramped off and out of the Great Hall.

"Next time, we put out the fire first." James said.

"Agreed." Sirius said before the boys walked to their respective seats and began eating their Halloween meal as if nothing had happened.

**Yeah, sorry it's been a good bit of time since last update. Life is busy, yet boring; go figure!**

**So, I've been to the movies enough to be considered a movie junkie now, and I just saw Dark Knight, which was great. I've seen Wall-E three times and several (or more) other movies. Anyone else seen some good movies this summer?**

**Oh, and I have a new poll in my profile: Which Twilight character would you most like to meet! (Choose three) so check that out! Reviews are welcomed with open arms!**

**PS (I know, this is wayy too long for an A/N) For all you Miley/Hannah haters or tolerators: Read Miley the Muggle:Hannah goes to Hogwarts, by MemberOfTheSugarCoatedCrew! It's pretty great.**


	21. Nicknames

Chapter 21 Chapter 21

Then next month flew by in a very entertaining whir. It began with a game of celebratory truth or dare. What we were celebrating, I still am unsure of…

"Ooh! Can we play truth or dare?" Shay asked excitedly one evening.

I groaned. "Shay, I hate that game and you know it!"

"Please!" She begged me. The others were already contemplating it and so far the only people who resisted were Remus and I. Alice wasn't fond of the idea, but was swayed to in less than a minute.

"You don't have a choice, Remmy!" Sirius declared. "You are a marauder and marauders never back out of truth or dare!"

So I was the only resister. "Lily, it'll be fun!"

"Come on now, flower!"

"Aw, Lils, don't ruin Shay's fun!"

"Just do it already!"

My friends were all immensely irritating at the moment. "Fine!" I screamed, a bit louder than necessary. Shay squealed in delight and I glared at the circle of friends. James, whom was sitting beside me, tightened his arm around my waist.

"It won't be that bad, I promise." He assured me. I nodded with a sense of loss as the game began…

It started out simple. A spell to make you not tell lies. It wasn't strong, but I doubt any of us could get out of it. 'I dare you to do a strip dance' was a bit out there, but Sirius did it none-the-less. Even when we begged him to stop.

By eleven o'clock there was a bottle of fire whiskey going around. Shay had already streaked through the hallways, I had snogged Remus (something James wasn't too keen on allowing), and Peter had attempted to snog a Ravenclaw girl, which resulted in him having a very silly looking slap mark across his cheek.

The truths were hardly even existent in this game. Sirius would mock anyone who chose truth until they switched to dare. The few truths that were told were insignificant and made the game boring. After finding out Peter wears briefs and Sirius fantasizes about Shay wearing a thong, the truths faded away into nothingness and the dares that followed were worse.

As the game went on into the night, and the players were consuming the fire whiskey and the dares got considerably less appropriate and even verged on the impossible.

"Pete, truth or dare!" Sirius called across our circle.

"Dare…" The word was barely out of his mouth before Sirius shouted his dare at him.

"I dare you to kiss the giant squid!"

Peter looked perplexed. "How am I supposed to manage that?" He asked Sirius, whom had probably consumed the majority of the fire whiskey bottle that was going around.

"If I make it possible, you gotta do it. 'Kay?" Peter nodded. "Eeexxelent." Sirius said in a sinister tone of voice. "Truth or dare James!"

"Sirius, it's not your…" Remus tried to tell the boy that it was Peter's turn, but Sirius shushed him and looked at James.

James sighed. "Dare."

"I dare you to propose to McGonagall!"

James laughed. "When?" He asked. He didn't seem at all shocked by his best friend's dare for him.

"Breakfast. Hold on…" Sirius said as he walked over to his four-poster. We were in the boy's common room for another reason that was unknown to me. I supposed that it was Sirius' idea, he being the one with the fire whiskey under his bed.

"Here!" Sirius called as he threw something at James' head. James' reflexes were fast and he caught it before it collided with his nose. It was a small silk box. James opened it to reveal a ring that looked like a golden smiley face.

"You want me to propose with this?" James asked him with one eyebrow raised.

Sirius nodded. "Yup! Say something cheesy too like… You're class overwhelms me with joy, you're smile makes me happy, will you marry me? Be creative!" Sirius ordered.

James chuckled. "'Kay."

"Remus! Truth or dare." Remus had his nose in a book and he sighed in regret as he muttered 'dare' back to Sirius who was grinning wickedly.

"I dare you, at the first quidditch game of the season, to dress up as a cheerleader and cheer on Gryffindor!"

"By cheerleader, you mean…" Remus looked horrified.

Sirius was still grinning from ear to ear. He took out his wand and went over by his bed, changing pillows and such into an outfit. He held up a red and gold miniskirt with a matching tank top.

"Sirius, Sirius, Sirius…" James scoffed. "Here, allow me to help you…" James made a few alterations, adding a large letter 'G' to the front of the tank top and the word 'Gryffindor' along the back of the skirt. He also added a pair of strappy, two-inch heels to the mix.

"Thank you, my friend!" Sirius exclaimed when the two boys were finished. Remus was pale just looking at the outfit his friends had created. Peter was rolling with laughter and Shay was cracking up on a rug on the floor. Even Alice and I couldn't help but stifle our giggles as we looked at the very feminine outfit.

"S-Sirius, you… you won't… I… you won't…" Remus mumbled.

Sirius smiled back at the boy. "Oh yes, I will make you wear this because _you_ said dare. You should've seen this coming, Moony."

I was abruptly brought back to reality. "Sirius! Truth or dare?" I barked at him.

He seemed taken aback. "Dare," He said cockily.

"Tell me what your nicknames mean," I told him. All of the boys stopped laughing and grinning.

"Lily, we can't tell you that…" James began, but the truth spell was too much for Sirius.

"It's because Remus is a…"

"No!" James slapped his hand over Sirius' mouth. _Lucky timing, _I thought bitterly.

"You have to tell me! It's in the rules of this game!" I called at them, all of them.

"Lily, this isn't Sirius' secret to tell. Don't force this on any of us, and don't expect an answer because… because…"

Remus interjected. "James." James stopped speaking. "I… Lily, I will tell you. But only you. Sorry," He added to Shay and Alice.

"Aw! But…" Shay began

"It's okay, it's your choice, Remus." Alice said.

Remus took a deep breath. "Thanks," he said to them. He turned to me. "Do you mind if it's not right now?"

I shook my head. I regretted yelling at James and Sirius. This was obviously something that Remus was uncomfortable with. Maybe I pushed it…

"Take your time." I said quietly.

"Truth or dare!" Sirius nearly sang.

"Sirius, I'm kinda getting tired. Could we please stop?" Alice asked.

"Yeah, me too," I confessed.

"No!" Sirius screeched.

"Goodnight, Sirius," Shay said as she pecked him lightly on the cheek. James followed Shay, Alice and I out of the room.

"Goodnight," I told the two girls who went up to the girl's dormitory.

"'Night," They both responded.

James and I walked back to our common room quietly. "Sorry about… About the… I didn't mean to make anyone uncomfortable! But nobody has ever told me and I have asked before and I wanted to know but I felt bad about making Remus feel awkward and you and Sirius and Peter all looked uncomfortable."

"It's okay, Lily. You'll understand when Remus tells you. It's just not something we're… comfortable talking about," James explained.

"Well I'm a shmuck… Here I am bringing the whole thing up again," I muttered darkly, staring at my feet.

"Lily," James stopped and pulled my face up so that he could look me in my eyes. "It's all going to be fine. It's not your fault that you're curious." He smiled crookedly at me and I think that (if I were trying to breathe) all of the air had left from my lungs into an unknown passageway.

I gasped in a gulp of air as I flew back into reality, but luckily James didn't notice. I smiled back at him and we continued to walk to the Head's common room.

"Goodnight," I told him, leaning up to brush my lips against his earlobe. I swear that he shivered and I smirked as I decided to leave him at that. I turned and walked to my bedroom.

I though I heard James mutter something under his breath that sounded like 'tease' and smiled to myself. I dressed and went to bed only to wake up far too early.

I sighed as I sat up. I showered for as long as I could manage and got dressed slowly. _Why couldn't I just sleep?_ I asked myself wearily.

I trudged into the common room and out the door. I hadn't made it ten paces when I voice caught up with me.

"Hey, Lily." I spun around to see Remus standing before me. I exhaled deeply.

"Hi, Remus," I said as I began to walk again.

"So… is now a good time… you know, to tell you about the… er… nicknames?" He asked me. I stopped as I suddenly remembered.

"Oh, yes! This is fine!" I said.

Remus looked uncomfortable. "Well, and you promise not to blame the others?" He asked suddenly.

"Blame them for what?"

"You won't take anything out on them, right?"

"Remus, what are you talking about?" I asked.

He sighed. "My nickname is Moony. I… I come out at the full moon. I'm a… a werewolf." Remus' voice was hardly a whisper. I felt my face go white…

**So, that's for giving me 3 reviews last chapter. I was really sad about that. I checked every day! (Seriously, ask EmpressesPenguinOfTheUniverse, I was at her house)**

**NOTE: new story out by Penguin and me, The Snog of Deadly Misery, under the penname mismatchedsocktwins. Please check it out. I garuntee you a good laugh! **

**Review! And OME! What'd you think of Breaking Dawn, Twilighters?**


	22. A truth and a Proposal

**Chapter 22**

I stared at Remus in disbelief. "A… a werewolf…?" I pondered it. His sick grandmother… His own illnesses that came around once a month… It all seemed to fit, but… a werewolf?

Remus looked more nervous now. "Er… I… I understand if you're… repulsed by… me," Remus mumble in a hardly coherent tone of voice before turning to walk away down the hall.

"Remus!" I nearly yelled. _How could he possibly think that I would be that… that… vain? To not like him because of something that HE can't even control!_ Remus turned to look at me sadly. I enveloped him in a hug.

"How could you even _think_ like that? Of course I'm not… repulsed by you? Really? You thought that? Oh, Remus!" I felt like I should be talking to a five year old who just broke something and thought that I would hate them for it. Only the five year old happened to be seventeen. And almost half a foot taller than me.

"You… You really aren't… you're okay… you still… like me?" He asked me in wonder. He sounded astounded at the very though.

"Of course I still like you, Remus! You're… it's not your fault," I murmured.

We were silent for a moment. "Thanks, Lily. But, if you don't mind, can I ask why you aren't more… shocked or… or angry about this?"

I thought about that momentarily. "Well, you didn't really give me time to think about anger! You were ready to just leave me!" He seemed to chuckle lightly at this. I smiled. "And maybe… maybe I, in the back of my mind, already was expecting something like this… I don't know; it just seems like I should've figured this out… ages ago really!

"It just all fits perfectly and I even wondered why you got sick so often, at least once a month and… It must've already clicked somewhere in my mind that I just couldn't get to. That and I wasn't going to let you walk away from me! Where would I go for _good_ advice? And if I ever needed to ask you something about the other marauders" _James_, my mind supplied involuntarily. "You've always been a friend, Remus. I'm not going to let you leave now over something like _this_!"

Remus seemed to get more serious. "This _is_ serious though. Don't take it for granted. I will do my best to stay as far from anybody during the… transformation," the word was muttered and hardly audible. "But you have to be… be…" He groaned in frustration.

"I understand," I said. At least, I think I understood what he was trying to tell me… "Are you going to tell the others?" I asked him quietly, changing the subject –which Remus seemed thankful of-.

"I… I don't know. Do you think I… can? What if they aren't as… understanding? Shay… what if she hates me? And Alice…" He seemed to shudder at the thought. _That's strange, _I thought, but shoved the thought from my head before it had time to progress.

"Alice is understanding. She _will_ understand and she'll probably admire you for confiding in her. Shay… Shay might need some more time." I muttered.

"Let's hope she takes it like Sirius did," Remus said with a faint smile. I looked at him questioningly. He laughed lightly and said; "Twelve year-old Sirius thought it was the coolest thing on the planet at first. Then he got more serious about it."

Then something else clicked. "What about the others?"

"Huh?" Remus asked me.

"Padfoot, is it? And Wormtail and… Prongs. Why are they called that?" I asked him. He seemed to get the uncomfortableness back.

"You, you have to swear not to be… angry with them. I wasn't fond of the idea at first, but they really help me so much that…" He trailed off.

"Okay," I said quietly.

Remus sighed. "They're all… animaguses." I stared in shock. I was not expecting that one in the least.

"But… You have to be of age and it's extremely complex and… they can't be!" I declared.

"Oh, let me correct myself. They are _illegal_ animaguses. They studied how to do it until fifth year. They finally made the transformation in fifth year. I'm still amazed that they pulled it off," Remus said in admiration.

"That's so… dangerous! What were they thinking! That's highly illegal! They could go to Azkaban for that!" I started ranting.

Remus put a hand on my shoulder. "Lily, I agree that it was very irresponsible for them to do that, but… They know the costs and it's just so much… _easier_ for me when they are around. And they obviously can't use their human forms; that's more dangerous than anything the ministry could ever do." Remus shuddered at the very thought of them being around him in their human forms when he was a werewolf.

I didn't look at Remus or speak for a while. I leaned back against the wall of the corridor and slid down until I was sitting on the floor of the corridor. "Why would they even consider that?" I asked in barely a whisper.

Remus slid down the wall beside me. "They were… scared for me. After they figured out what was going on it became easier for them to recognize the bruises and the… marks that I had given myself. It was painful, but I tried to act less in pained so that they wouldn't take it so hard. They saw right through what I was trying to do.

"They felt useless. They couldn't help me in any way and, though I told them that I was going to be fine, they still felt awful. I could see it on their faces. Especially when I had to be in the hospital wing after the full moon because of a bad injury. They would stay the night under the invisibility cloak. I couldn't even look at them. I hated seeing how bad that _they_ felt for _me_.

"So James asked about human transformations in Transfiguration in second year."

"I remember that," I whispered.

"He realized that becoming another creature might be able to help me. It took them until fifth year to do the necessary research and be able to transform themselves completely. I was ashamed that I was the reason that they went through so much… pain just to spend those awful nights with me. I wished that they hadn't done something so… permanent… reckless just for me.

"Later I realized how grateful I was for their presence at that time of the month. With them I injured myself less often. They kept me company and therefore I was calmer. If I did begin to injure myself, they were there to stop me. I rely on them, Lily. They made a very reckless decision, but you have no idea how much it helps me." Remus concluded as he was slowly brought out of his own story.

I swallowed. 'Wow' was all that I could manage to say for a few minutes. "Thank you, Remus. For telling me. For trusting me." I said finally. He smiled softly.

"Thank you for understanding, Lily. But if we delay this much longer we are going to be late for class." Remus stood up and leant his hand out to me. I brushed myself off and walked to breakfast with him.

"You know, I think we should give Sirius a dare. He wouldn't refuse." I said suddenly. Remus' face lit up.

"Yes, I do think that Sirius needs to be doing _something._ Let's go consult James after he finishes proposing to McGonagall. He'll have a good idea." I laughed.

"Come on, I don't want to miss his proposal!" I walked faster to the Great Hall. When we entered James met our gazes quickly and stood up, flashing us a grin as he went.

He made it in front of the teacher's table, in front of McGonagall and looked straight at her. I could tell he was smiling widely. He then proceeded to getting up on the teacher's table. As if enough people weren't looking at him already, he put his wand to his throat and muttered a spell.

"Good morning ladies and gentlemen of Hogwarts," James' voice boomed. "I have something very important to ask right now, so if I could have everyone's attention." Everyone in the Great Hall was staring at him with looks of confusion, wonder, and admiration.

He then turned to Professor McGonagall. "Minerva," her face turned a shade of pink very quickly. "From the moment I set foot into your classroom, I was entranced by you. Your teaching style is like no other I have ever had! So with this being said," James got down on one knee with the silky box in his hand. "Minerva, will you marry me?" He asked with a huge grin on his face as he opened the box to her.

The Great Hall burst into laughter and people wolf-whistling. McGonagall looked loss for words. Dumbledore was even grinning. "I… you… detention!" She roared before getting out of her seat and heading for the door.

"Would you still like the ring?" James called after her, mocking a hurt look.

"No!" She screamed and left the room. James shrugged and hopped off of the table. He began to walk towards where we were standing when Sirius caught up to him giving him a high-five.

"Did you see her face?" He asked through tears of laughter.

We went to sit down by Peter, Shay, and Alice. Remus and I murmured our plan to dare Sirius and they all seemed thrilled by it. When we left the Great Hall for our first class, I sat next to James and hurriedly told him about it as well.

"Sounds great," he whispered back to me while sitting in Charms. "Any clue to what we're going to do?"

"Not exactly… Remus said that you'd have the best idea. Though he did mention a few things…"

"Sirius, we have a dare for you," James said later than evening.

"Oh really? What is it?" He asked excitedly.

"Will you do it?" James asked him.

"Of course! I'm a marauder!" Sirius said in a tone that clearly said 'duh'. "Now what is it?"

**Okay, I have several ideas for Sirius' dare, anyone else have anything they would like to see Sirius do? Give me some more suggestions please! Review please!**

**Oh, and I revised the oneshots 'You Hate Me, Don't You?' and 'Reasons Why I hate You, or Love you' so check those out and if you read them before PM me or review telling me if I made them better or worse please! :D **


	23. The Prank

**WARNING: May cause you to laugh a lot, fall out of your chair, hit your head  
on the bookshelf and then laugh until you cry. :)**

_Previously on An Extreme Seventh Year…_

"_Sirius, we have a dare for you," James said later than evening._

"_Oh really? What is it?" He asked excitedly. _

"_Will you do it?" James asked him. _

"Of course! I'm a marauder!" Sirius said in a tone that clearly said 'duh'. "Now what is it?"

**Chapter 23**

"Well, and you can back out now, there are a few different ideas that we want to throw upon you." James said carefully.

"You mean like a two part dare?" Sirius asked, his eyes gleaming with excitement.

James pondered this and tried not to laugh at his excitement for what was coming to him. "More like… Three part." James said with a sheepish smile at Sirius. Sirius only seemed more pleased at this information.

"Great! I'm in. What'd you guys come up with?" Sirius asked with anticipation etched into every single line of his face.

"Well Sirius," Shay walked up to him holding something behind her back. "I know how you love that little black leather miniskirt that I have, so you're going to wear it. For a week." She added with a mischievous smile. Sirius seemed a bit flustered but quickly covered it up and smiled arrogantly.

"What else have you got?" He asked James.

"We think," Remus began, taking a step towards the boy. "That your hair would look better… green." Sirius grew pale when he heard the words come from Remus' mouth.

"With orange spikes." I added into the mush. Sirius was much more flustered than before.

"For a week." James smiled pleasantly at his very flustered friend.

"My…my hair? Green?" Sirius whispered hoarsely. He looked like he would rather die than have his sacred hair look this way; like our idea was completely blasphemous!

"For a week, yes. Is this a problem for the oh-so-daring Sirius Black?" James asked mockingly with a smirk.

Sirius quickly regained his composure. "No, I'll do it. What's part three?"

James was particularly fond of part three. He had come up with it himself and it was sure to have Sirius all but begging for mercy. "Part three is something that I came up with. You are going to walk around charmed to look like Snape."

"For a week." We all added for dramatic affect.

It worked; Sirius' eyes were wide with shock and vulnerability. "But… but… Snivellus? But… oh Jamesie! Please don't make my hair greasy!" Sirius sobbed overdramatically as he dropped to the ground and proceeded to cling to James' pant leg for dear life.

"Sirius! Your hair is going to be green with orange spikes, nobody will even notice the grease. You'll just have an abnormally long, greasy nose and other Snape-like characteristics." James explained calmly and sweetly. "You can always back out now and not do the dare…" James suggested.

"No! I am a marauder and I will do all of your dares!" Sirius nearly screamed. James simply smiled at his friend.

"Glad to hear it, Mate. Now let's see," James got out his wand and pondered something before pointing it at Sirius' face. Sirius flinched as his face contorted. His nose grew in length, as well as his "perfect" hair becoming stragglier looking. He grew more pale and sallow.

"I feel greasier already." Sirius said, ashamed. Remus was next. He also pointed his wand at Sirius' head, and his hair began to gel itself into perfect, tall, neon orange-tipped spikes on his now pea-soup-green hair.

"I'll let you change into this," Shay handed him the skirt. "On your own." Sirius left to change into the skirt and arrived back a half and hour later wearing said skirt. He still looked much like Sirius, somehow. I found it very difficult not to laugh at him; I think we all found this hard.

"You look amazing!" James complemented sarcastically. The rest of us were still trying not to laugh at him.

"I tried to avoid the mirror, but the green and orange made that pretty close to impossible." Sirius murmured, horrified with himself.

"'S only a week, mate." James said, clapping him on his shoulder.

Sirius groaned. "A long week, that's for sure! Wait! I don't have to wear this," he indicated to himself in general. "When I commentate? And go to classes? McGonagall will kill me!"

"A dare is a dare. You can back out now, if you'd like," James suggested. This was part of the plan; if Sirius got to talking like he was going to quit, you said the words 'you don't have to' and Sirius would do it for sure. I think it's a male thing, that is…

"No! I am amazing and I will do all of your dares because I'm Sirius Black!"

"'Kay. What do you say we all go to lunch?" James asked casually, trying not to smirk.

"I'm not hungry," Sirius tried to say, but his stomach deceived him.

"I think you are, my friend. Come on!" Shay took Sirius' hand and all but dragged him to the Great Hall. When we walked in the room fell quite silent.

"Who's that?" Someone asked their neighbor.

"Why'd she dump Black for that guy?" One girl asked with obvious distaste.

"What ever, means Sirius Black is momentarily single!" her friend said back with a grin that clearly said she was going to find him as soon as she possibly could and began to stand up from her seat.

"He most certainly is not!" Shay exclaimed. "Are you, Sirius?" She asked him. He turned very pink. The girls were in shock. Everyone in the near vicinity was in shock.

"Erm… no…" He muttered barely coherently. The hall erupted into whispers, which then lead to massive laughter.

"Come on, you made it through the worst," James told his friend as we sat down at the very end of the Gryffindor table.

"I doubt it…" Sirius muttered as he glanced up at a group of Slytherins making their way over to us.

"Hey! Black! Are you a cross dresser now?" They erupted into their own laughter and the Great Hall fell silent.

"And what's with the grease? You finally realize Severus looks better than you?" They laughed again.

Sirius glared at them but Peter was the one with the comeback. "Even Snivellus couldn't pull of those spikes like Sirius can!" The boys just laughed harder and walked away.

Sirius didn't eat any lunch after all; he just glared at his food dejectedly. It made me almost sad to see him this way… But the boy did deserve it! Over all the years he taunted other students, it's about time he gets some kind of taste of his own medicine.

**So this has ****kinda**** taken forever. I know, and I'm very sorry that this isn't overly long of anything of the sort. Would you believe that I just failed my English quiz? My third one in 11 days. High school is proving itself challenging to me, and I apologize that you have to suffer (well, not really SUFFER but you know what I mean… I hope) because I can't get all the work done with time to spare. **

**Right now, I should be doing my homework, actually, but I decided to post this because you guys mean way more to me than my English teacher does! Please review! And I have gotten something done on this site with my friend, Lara (I have to be at her house nearly everyday and we try to make the best of our time), so to read some of that find the user name 'mismatchedsocktwins' and we have 3 Harry Potter related (Sirius) tales up. Check it out if you're interested or bored or whatever! Lollipop**


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